King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofia of Spain celebrate their golden wedding anniversary today. Although – celebrate? Maybe that’s not the correct word to use right now. In any case, the couple got married exactly 50 years ago, on 14 May 1962. 

At the time, Juan Carlos, though a (very) royal Prince by blood, was in a politically awkward position. His family had left Spain in exile in the 1930s after the second Spanish Republic was proclaimed. Born in exile but allowed to live in his own country, he had no certainty of ever regaining the throne. General Franco, the Spanish dictator, had promised Juan Carlos that he would be the man to succeed him after his death, but Franco’s loyalties wavered between Juan Carlos and his cousin Alfonso, Duke of Anjou and Cadiz, who had married Franco’s granddaughter. Although Juan Carlos had officially been designated heir and given the title “Prince of Spain,” he could never be sure the General wouldn’t change his mind after all. One could say, then, that Juan Carlos was perhaps not the match with the best prospects for Sofia, a princess of the (then) reigning Greek royal family. Another obstacle was their religion: Juan Carlos was (and is) Catholic, hoping to restore the throne to a Catholic country, and Sofia was an Orthodox Christian.

King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofia of Spain, 2004.

Still, the couple decided to get married and the match received the approbation of both the Greek King Paul and the Spanish dictator General Franco. They were to marry in Athens, Greece, and Sofia converted to Catholicism. To make sure all were happy, Juan Carlos and Sofia married three times: once in a Catholic ceremony in the Saint Dyonisius Church, an Orthodox ceremony in the Metropolitan Cathedral of the Virgin Mary, and a civil ceremony at the Royal Palace. The day ended in a lavish banquet for the thousands of guests, among which many royals of reigning and non-reigning families.

The couple was soon blessed with two daughters and a son: Infanta Elena (b. 1963), Infanta Cristina (b. 1965) and Felipe, Prince of Asturias (b. 1968). During the early years of their marriage, the shadow of Franco hung over their happiness. In public, Juan Carlos, as designated heir, supported the dictator in all his decisions. In secret, he consulted the opposition and prepared for a more liberal course once he was restored to the Spanish throne.

In 1975, these difficult years ended: upon the death of General Franco, Juan Carlos could finally ascend to the throne and restore the Spanish monarchy, as well as bringing democracy back to his country. In 1981, just six years after he ascended to the throne, Juan Carlos was faced with a military coup. By refusing to support the coup, in front of Parliament and wearing his military uniform, he not only saved his country from another few decades of dictatorship, he also made his way into the hearts of his people and gave the – then still shaky – Spanish monarchy a firmer foundation.

As monarchs, Juan Carlos and Sofia faced turbulent times, but they managed together to give the country and the monarchy the stability they needed.

Queen Sofia and King Juan Carlos of Spain, 2005.

Their marriage seemed to be the perfect example of happiness, up until a few years ago, when the facade began to crumble down. Rumours galore were circulating about the King’s extramarital affairs, but out of respect for the man himself, most media refused to publish. When Felipe made his choice to marry Letizia, a divorcee who had worked as a journalist, this too is said to have caused arguments at Zarzuela palace. And let’s not forget a biography about Queen Sofia, published a few years ago, claiming the Queen is the loneliest woman in all of Spain. According to this book, the Queen discovered the first extra-marital affair just a few months after their enthronement, and the couple hasn’t shared a bedroom since then.

Which of course leads us to the past few weeks. King Juan Carlos, once so beloved by his country for almost singlehandedly breaking the coup in 1981, was publicly despised for his trip to Botswana, hunting elephants and, just for good measure, taking his mistress with him. The mistress, German princess Corinna zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, lives near the Zarzuela palace and has been part of his life for many years now. Queen Sofia didn’t return from London, where she was visiting her brother, the exiled King Constantine II of Greece, to support her husband in the hospital.

Whether or not this has had some influence on the decision that there will be no festivities today at the Spanish court, is unknown. The King is still recovering from the injuries he sustained on his Botswana hunting trip, so perhaps that’s the reason. And of course, Spain is going through a huge economic recession, with almost 25% of the population unemployed and austerity measures imposed by the government, so a lavish party might sort of give the wrong idea. More malicious tongues say that Sofia no longer wants to pretend she’s happily married, and is happy to just go to Queen Elizabeth II’s banquet by herself without her cheating husband.

As far as the truth goes, I suppose we’ll never really know. Fact is that this 50th wedding anniversary is overshadowed by the recent scandals, so unforgettable though it will be for Juan Carlos and Sofia, I’m sure they had hoped for different memories of this day.

Picture credits

King Juan Carlos of Spain and Queen Sofía at a visit to the Bush Ranch in Crawford, Texas, November 2004. Picture is in the public domain.

Queen Sofia and King Juan Carlos of Spain, at the Ibero-American summit in Salamanca, Spain, 2005. Used under Creative Commons license.

Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall will be visiting Canada to celebrate Queen Elizabeth II’s Diamond Jubilee from May 20-23, 2012. Their visit coincides with the Victoria Day long weekend, which honours a monarch significant for both the longevity of her reign and her influence over Canadian history. Queen Victoria is the only other monarch to celebrate a Diamond Jubilee, presiding over a parade and thanksgiving service in London, England, in 1897.

In contrast to Elizabeth II’s Diamond Jubilee, which is being marked by visits to all the Commonwealth realms by members of the royal family, Queen Victoria’s Jubilee brought the British Empire to London. The Canadian Delegation headed the “Colonial Procession” with the newly knighted Prime Minister Sir Wilfrid Laurier riding in a carriage flanked by the Canadian Cavalry, the Toronto Grenadiers and the Royal Canadian Highlanders (1).

Princess Louise, Marchioness of Lorne, as Viceregal Consort of Canada

The Canadian people were celebrating a sovereign who had exercised a profound influence over the development of the nation.  When four of Canada’s ten present day provinces, Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia achieved confederation as the Dominion of Canada in 1867, they were united by their loyalty to the crown. The first Prime Minister, Sir John A. MacDonald brought together the diverse interests of these regions by reminding them that the Queen wished for them to unite as a self-governing Dominion (2). According to legend, Queen Victoria also selected Ottawa as the capital of this new nation as it is sufficiently inland from the United States, in the event of an invasion. Her son-in-law, the Marquess of Lorne, served as Governor General from 1878-1883, residing there at Rideau Hall with Princess Louise.

The Queen in Toronto, 2010

Ottawa was one of the settings for the most recent royal visits to Canada as Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge celebrated Canada Day there in 2010 and 2011 respectively. The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh also visited Halifax, Winnipeg, and Toronto, while William and Kate included Montreal, Prince Edward Island, Yellowknife, and Calgary in their itinerary.  Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall will be visiting the Gagetown Canadian Forces Base at Gagetown, Oromocto, New Brunswick, Saint John, New Brunswick, Toronto, Ontario, and Regina Saskatchewan, four places that were not included on the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s itinerary. The Diamond Jubilee tour will be the fourth royal visit to Canada in as many years.

This abundance of royal visits is part of the revival of popular interest in Canada’s constitutional monarchy that has occurred in the past few years. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s decision to visit Canada on their first overseas tour as a married couple symbolized the future of the constitutional monarchy in Canada and the wider commonwealth. The newlyweds were acclaimed for their fresh approach to the traditional royal tour, engaging in long, informal conversations with ordinary Canadians and participating in sports such as Dragon Boat racing and street hockey.

Kate in Ottawa for Canada Day 2011

The Duke of Cambridge charmed audiences with his speeches that displayed both admiration for Canada and its institutions and a self-deprecating sense of humour regarding his command of the French language. The Duchess was praised for choosing fashions that ordinary women could imagine themselves wearing and for her warmth toward six year old cancer survivor Diamond Marshall, who presented her with flowers upon the couple’s arrival in Calgary. The large crowds and enthusiasm that greeted the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge at every stop along the tour were reminiscent of the future Edward VIII’s travels in Canada during the 1920s and King George VI’s and Queen Elizabeth’s cross Canadian tour in 1939 rather than the post Second World War royal visits, which received less positive attention.

The political circumstances following the Second World War minimized the popular perception of the royal family’s role in Canada. After the war, Governors General were native-born Canadians rather than members of the British aristocracy who often had direct ties to the royal family, such as the Duke of Argyll. Although the Queen was present for such significant events in twentieth century Canadian history as the opening of the Saint Lawrence Seaway, and the repatriation of the constitution, these events were largely seen as part of Canada’s coming of age as a nation by the wider public. A growing distance between Canada and its constitutional monarchy appeared to be part of this process.

Resentment of the crown in Quebec during the Quiet Revolution of the 1960s and 1970s as a symbol of the British conquest of French Canada further complicated popular perceptions of the monarchy. In 1964, the Queen faced hostile separatists in Quebec City who turned their backs on the royal procession. When Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau invited the Queen to open the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Quebec Premier René Levesque attempted to dissuade her from accepting this invitation. As recently as 2008, the Queen was not invited to Quebec City’s birthday celebrations out of sensitivity for Quebecois popular opinion. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s successful visits to Montreal and Quebec City in 2011 did much to improve the popular perception of the royal family in Quebec.

Charles and Camilla at Dundurn Castle, Ontario, in 2009

In recent years, there has been an outpouring of eloquent defenses of the crown by authors who argue that the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s popularity on their 2011 tour is part of a wider understanding of the crown’s significance to Canadian history and politics. In The Secret of the Crown: Canada’s Affair with Royalty, journalist John Fraser provides an eloquent defense of both the continuing importance of the crown to Canada and Prince Charles’s suitability to be the future King of Canada. Since Prince Charles will be representing the Queen for the Canadian Diamond Jubilee celebrations, the 2012 publication of this book is well timed to influence the Canadian response to Prince Charles’s visit.

The themes raised in The Secret of the Crown, including the special relationship between the crown and certain groups within Canadian society such as the Armed Forces and the First Nations, the roles of Governors General and Lieutenant Governors, and the significance of royal tours, are expanded upon in the articles included in the Queen’s University School of Policy Studies Volume, The Evolving Canadian Crown, while Nathan Tidridge explains precisely how the constitutional monarchy functions in Canada’s Constitutional Monarchy.

Canada is currently experiencing a revival of popular interest in its constitutional monarchy. The Jubilee tour by Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall will be the fourth royal tour of Canada in the past few years after a long period in which royal visits to Canada received little attention. If the royal couple’s visits to New Brunswick, Ontario and Saskatchewan are well received, the Renaissance of the Canadian crown will continue as a new generation engages with Canada’s constitutional monarchy.

References
1. Diane Peters, “A Celebration of Empire: Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee” (Wilfrid Laurier University Library: 1997), p. 25-29. pi.library.yorku.ca/ojs/index.php/caml/article/download/…/2873
2. Richard Gwyn, John A.: The Man Who Made Us. The Life and Times of John A. MacDonald, Volume One: 1815-1867 (Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2008), p. 370-389.

Photo credits
Princess Louise, Marchioness of Lorne, as Viceregal Consort of Canada, public domain.
The Queen at Queens Park, Toronto, in 2010 by Wikimedia Commons member Ibagli, public domain.
The Duchess of Cambridge in Ottawa, July 2011, by Flickr member pat00139 and used under Creative Commons licence.
The Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall at Dundurn Castle, Ontario, in 2009 by Wikimedia Commons member Ibagli, public domain.

Cry and weep, marriageable women all over the world who had hoped to catch Europe’s last royal bachelor heir, for he is finally getting hitched. Yesterday morning a Belgian newspaper already reported it, and the Luxembourg Prime Minister confirmed it later that day at a press conference.  Guillaume, Hereditary Grand Duke of Luxembourg is engaged to the Belgian Countess Stéphanie de Lannoy.

Engagement photo of Hereditary Grand Duke Guillaume and Countess Stéphanie © Cour grand-ducale / Christian Aschman

Hereditary Grand Duke Guillaume, now 30 years old, met Countess Stéphanie some five years ago at a ball in Beloeil, the home of the Princely de Ligne family, cousins of the Luxembourg royals. In the beginning, the couple met secretly in Belgium, where nobody would recognise them. Two years ago, they became a couple and were introduced to each other’s family. On 26 April 2012 the engagement of the two was officially announced at a press conference held by Prime Minister Juncker.

Stéphanie, daughter of  Count Philippe de Lannoy and Countess Alix, née della Faille de Leverghem, is the youngest of 8 children. She was born on 18 February 1984 and grew up on the family estate in Angvaing, Belgium. She was sent to a Flemish primary school, then attended Collège Sainte-Odile in the north of France and the Brussels l’Institut de la Vierge Fidèle. After her secondary studies, she moved to Russia for a year, to study the language and literature. Then she continued her university studies at the Université Catholique de Louvain-La-Neuve in Belgium, where she graduated in Germanic Philology, magna cum laude. After her studies she started working for an investment firm.

Being of noble birth, with a university education and fluency in French, German and English, as well as some knowledge of Dutch and Russian, love for literature and music, one could think that this girl is just about the perfect wife for the Hereditary Grand Duke. These are, after all, all qualities he once mentioned himself in an interview when asked what his ideal wife would be like.

But unfortunately the celebrations at the Luxembourg court are a bit overshadowed, as the tabloids claim that history is – once more- repeating itself. Grand Duchess Maria Teresa, so it seems, was less than happy with her son’s choice and tried to break up the relationship only last year. Rumour has it she tried to set up her eldest son with Madeleine of Sweden at the wedding celebrations of Albert and Charlene in Monaco last summer. If this is true, it is ,to say the least, very strange. Maria Teresa herself had a very difficult time being accepted by her in-laws, and Grand Duke Henri had to battle and threaten to give up his rights to the throne before they gave in. So why would she be difficult when her son finally makes a choice? Sad rumours, indeed.

However, the match is now quite obviously accepted, as the engagement was announced yesterday, Countess Stéphanie was presented to the different “national authorities” at a reception at the Grand Ducal Palace this morning. A photo shoot with the family of the couple at the Château de Berg follows this afternoon. The wedding date has not yet been announced, but the marriage will take place this year.

We at the Royal Universe wish the couple all the best!

Picture credits: © Cour grand-ducale – Christian Aschman. All rights reserved.

Last Tuesday, the third of a series of expert hearings took place, concerning the issue of whether Japanese princesses should be allowed in the future to keep their titles and create new family branches when they marry. (Currently, the Imperial House Law stipulates that female members who marry commoners must abandon their imperial status.)

In two earlier meetings, four other experts had backed the idea of female-headed family branches. But as the experts at this latest hearing, journalist Yoshiko Sakurai and Nihon University law professor Akira Momochi, are well known for their nationalist views, it did not come as a surprise that they opposed the plan. Although Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujimura has made it clear that the issue of allowing a woman to get succession rights (for herself or for her children) would not even be discussed, conservatives still fear that, in the long run, the creation of female-headed branches of the imperial family might finally lead to a female-line emperor. As New York Times journalist Norimitsu Onishi explains, the “opposition to a female line is part of a larger nationalist movement that seeks a tougher stance against China and North Korea, presses aggressively for a revisionist history of Japan’s wartime past, and pushes the myth of Japanese racial exceptionalism. Indeed, many [who are opposed to a female line] are the same politicians, scholars and journalists who contend that the Nanking Massacre was vastly exaggerated, that Japan invaded continental Asia to liberate it and that Japan was tricked into war by the United States.” One of the experts who gave their opinions last Tuesday, Ms. Sakurai, is a well-known journalist and social critic in Japan, especially famous for her rightwing and sometimes ultra-nationalistic stance. She maintains that the Nanking Massacre never took place and that the so-called “comfort women” (who were forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese military during World War II) were “not taken by force.”

Professor Momochi, the second expert of Tuesday’s hearing, was part of the minority that opposed an amendment of the Imperial House Law that then-prime minister Koizumi tried to realize back in 2006. At the time, there was no male heir in the youngest generation of the imperial family and Koizumi planned to pave the way for Princess Aiko, the only child of Crown Prince Naruhito, to become Japan´s ninth reigning empress. However, in September 2006, a male heir was finally born to the second son of Emperor Akihito, Prince Akishino, and Koizumi was succeeded by the conservative Shinzo Abe. As a result, the plan to change the succession law was shelved.

Last year, on October 5, Shingo Haketa, grand steward of the Imperial Household Agency (IHA), visited Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda (of the Democratic Party of Japan) at his office and told him it was a matter of urgency to enable female members of the imperial family to create family branches. Haketa explained that the IHA was concerned that it would become more and more difficult for the imperial family to perform its duties as the number of members decreased due to females losing their imperial status by marriage. Presently, Japan’s imperial family consists of 23 members, eight of whom are over the age of 60 and three of whom are children. Of the remaining 12, half are unmarried women between the ages of 20 and 30. Should they get married in quick succession and leave the imperial family, their absence could severely hurt the family’s ability to meet all of its demands.

Following Haketa’s request to work on a solution to this problem, the government recently set up a panel of senior officials and advisors to draft a report on the proposed creation of female imperial branch households. The experts whose opinions were sought in the two hearings that took place in February and March backed the plans to let the princesses keep their status when they marry. It was only during the latest hearing on April 10 that the idea met with opposition. Both Ms. Sakurai and Professor Akira Momochi both expressed strong concern over the recent discussions and said that female imperial family members should not be allowed to retain their royal status upon marriage because, according to them, such a system could eventually break the centuries-long paternal lineage of imperial blood. However, both experts admitted that the shrinking number of imperial family members is a matter that needs to be dealt with urgently. To retain the male line of emperors, the two suggested revising the Imperial Household Law so that male descendants of former imperial families which renounced their royal status in 1947 be allowed to return to the imperial family.

Emperor Go-Hanazono (1419–1471), adopted from the Fushimi-no-miya collateral branch by Emperor Shōkō

For most of the Tokugawa period (1603-1868) there were four imperial branch houses: the Fushimi, the Kan’in, the Arisugawa, and the Katsura households. If the main line failed to produce an heir, these cadet branches could provide a successor to the throne. However, not every prince born into these families would be allowed to keep his status and have a family of his own. Only one man, usually the eldest son, could hold the title at any one time. Non-heir sons in both the main Imperial House and the branch houses had two career options. They could “descend” to subject status with a noble title or enter the Buddhist priesthood as the head of a temple. Thus, the size of the imperial family was kept at a minimum. It was only with the Meiji Restoration, launched in 1868, that the number of imperial branch houses nearly tripled.

The Meiji Restoration was a chain of events that led to the defeat of the Tokugawa shogunate and restored imperial rule to Japan. Its supporters made the emperor and the imperial family the supreme symbol of legitimacy for the newly emerging order. It seemed logical to increase the number of collateral branches, which constituted the closest satellite to the imperial throne. Fortunately for the supporters of the monarchy, one of the princes from the collateral branches, Prince Fushimi Kuniye (1802-1875), happened to have 17 sons, most of whom became heads of the new founded imperial branch houses. The Fushimi-no-miya branch is the eldest of the collateral branches, having been founded in 1409 by a son of Emperor Sukō. On one hand that means that it is very old and venerable, but on the other hand it means that the descendants are but very remotely related to the modern emperors. By 1935, there were 11 collateral branches of the imperial family (in addition to the families of Emperor Showa’s three brothers), all of them descended from Prince Fushimi Kuniye. On 3 May 1947, the new constitution came into effect, designed to ensure universal equality under the law. The titles and prerogatives of the nobility were thus revoked, and the former elite became commoners like everybody else. Also, the 11 collateral branches lost their royal status.

At the hearing last Tuesday, Ms. Sakurai proposed to reinstate four of them. “There were too many, so they were cut back. Now we’re in the complete opposite position, why can’t we take the opposite measure?” she asked. However, for obvious economic reasons it is improbable that anybody would seriously consider reinstating the former imperial branches in their present form, even if only four of them. There is a second proposal, however, that seems at first glance more realistic: that the imperial family should adopt individuals from these branches to boost its size. Ms. Sakurai as well as professor Momochi mentioned this possibility at last Tuesday´s hearing.

Among East Asian societies, Japan is known for its indiscriminate practice of adoption compared with China and Korea, for example, where more stringent rules and prohibitions are imposed. Traditionally, all social classes in Japan used the instrument of adoption to continue the family line. However, upper-class Japanese seem to have resorted to adoption more than their lower-class counterparts. An informant from the former nobility told Japanese-born anthropologist Takie Sugiyama Lebra: “In our [noble] circle there is no resistance to being adopted as there is in the world outside, since almost everybody here becomes adopted. My [natal] house has continued fourteen generations, but more than half of those generations were headed by adopted sons.”

The nobility used to have recourse to this measure not only if there was a lack of natural sons but also if the sons born to the house were, for one reason or other, not considered fit to be heirs. There were several circumstances by which adoption was facilitated. First, there were few restrictions on who could be adopted. The adoptee could be an outsider as well as a close kinsman. If he were related to the adopting family, a sister’s son or daughter’s son was just as acceptable as a brother’s son, a younger brother could be adopted as a son, or a family with a daughter but no son could adopt a son-in-law. Successors were not necessarily adopted as children; sometimes a family decided to adopt a grown man or even a married couple. The only condition that was observed in nearly all cases bore a social character: successional adoptions almost always came from within the nobility. The adopted son could be “anybody,” but “of course, he must be the son of a nobleman.” There was a sound practical reason for this rule. One of her informants told Professor Lebra: “There wasn’t much variation in the career [of nobles] anyway. Everyone would end up as a member of the House of Peers, and the like.” He would thus joke with those of his Gakushuin classmates who were also adopted, saying that one’s adoptive house could well have been another’s. This means that if a noble family adopted the son of another noble family, they could rely on him to already know “the basics” of noble life and on his being socialized in a way that would enable him to adjust to and even come to identify himself with his new family in a relatively short time.

Emperor Kōkaku (1771–1840), adopted from the Kan'in-no-miya collateral branch by Emperor Go-Momozono

The second instance that served to facilitate adoption was that according to Japanese tradition, only one son could become successor while all other children, sons as well as daughters, had to leave the family. Whereas a daughter was expected to marry out, a nonsuccessor son from the nobility had several options that were similar to those of sons from the imperial family mentioned above. (1) He could set up his own house independently by giving up his noble status and becoming a commoner (whereas an imperial prince would “only” descend so far as to become a noble). In some cases there was an opportunity for a young nobleman that was very rarely offered to imperial princes: to become the head of a collateral branch of his natal family. But by doing this, a younger brother had to prolong his subordination to his elder brother and head of the main house and forego autonomy for good. (2) He could become a Buddhist monk. Again, the option is not unlike that offered to an imperial prince but has a more modest character. A son of the emperor entering the Buddhist priesthood would become the head of a temple that was specially designed to accommodate imperial offspring; a younger son of a noble would not aspire to such an exalted position. (3) Finally, he might be adopted by another noble house as its successor. In most cases, adoption was clearly the best deal. As a consequence, there usually was an ample supply of younger sons from whom a candidate for adoption might be chosen.

Count Sumiyoshi Kawamura, foster father of Emperor Hirohito and his brother Prince Chichibu

There is a third circumstance still to be mentioned that was conducive to the practice of adoption. Unlike in Japanese commoner families, where there was usually a strong emotional bond between a mother and her children (the father as a rule remained more of a distant figure), in noble families the relationships between children and both their parents were very formal. The reason for this was that custom required the children not to be raised by their parents, but instead to be raised either in foster families or, if they lived with their real parents, by personal servants (otsuki). Otsuki servants provided the child with personal warmth, guidance, nurturing, and a feeling of kinship, in compensation for the relative distance and aloofness of the parents. Informants from the former nobility told Professor Lebra: “We were most scared of mother, but never cried for her when she went out. It was when the servants went home on holidays that we cried and screamed.” “If I had had to choose [between mother and otsuki] I would have sided with my otsuki.” “When my mother died I did not cry, but when my otsuki passed away I did.” As a consequence, adoption was in no way seen as a means to satisfy personal needs of bonding and intimacy. If there was no special emotional bond between adopting parents and adoptee, this would not be experienced as a lack, as there was also no particular bond between parents and their natural children. This circumstance clearly served to further remove any obstacles to adoption on the personal and emotional level.

For the imperial family, adoption was not as trouble-free as for the nobility, mainly because a potential adoptee would have to be related by blood, however remotely, and to be a descendant in the male line from one of the former emperors. But apart from this condition, the fact that relationships between imperial family members bore a very formal character played an important role in facilitating adoption as an instrument to ensure the succession. Like in noble families, children, especially successor sons, would often be raised by foster families, and where that was not the case, personal servants would take over.

Count Nogi and his wife on the day of their ritual suicide by which they followed the deceased Meiji Emperor, Hirohito´s grandfather, into death (13 September 1912).

Emperor Hirohito, for example, at the age of two months, was handed over to the elderly Count Sumiyoshi Kawamura, a former admiral in the Imperial Japanese Navy, and his wife Countess Haruko. Kawamura had been very hesitant to accept this task, but at last promised to do his “duty.” One year later, Hirohito´s younger brother Yasuhito (later Chichibu) was born and joined him at the old admiral´s home. The two princes passed their first years in an atmosphere that was as homespun as it was ascetic. Kawamura´s favoured method of disciplining the often mischievous Hirohito was to threaten to declare Prince Chichibu the “senior” prince in the house. When Hirohito was only three years old, the admiral died at age 67. Later, from the age of seven, Hirohito´s education was supervised by the headmaster of the Peers School, General Maresuke Nogi, a popular national hero who would become one of the major influences on Hirohito’s life. When Hirohito was eleven, his grandfather, the Meiji Emperor died. On the day of the Emperor’s funeral, as the guns marking the departure of his coffin were fired from the imperial palace, Count Nogi sliced open his abdomen and his wife plunged a dagger into her throat in the traditional precept of Japanese ritual suicide, seppuku, by which the couple followed the Emperor into death.

It is this habit of having imperial children raised by people other than their natural parents, however, that has changed radically in the post-war era. The extent of the change becomes clear when we consider the obvious solution for a sonless crown prince like Prince Naruhito 150 years ago: he would have adopted either his little nephew or his younger brother. From a present-day perspective, it would seem absurd for the crown prince to adopt his brother, who is but 5 years his junior, and barbarian to take little Hisahito away from his natural parents just because his uncle happens to need a successor. But this only serves to demonstrate what a radical change in values has taken place since the 19th century. Not even ultraconservatives propose this solution. Instead, some of them suggest that the junior branches of the imperial family who have “but” female offspring, like the Mikasa and Takamado families (or even the bachelor Prince Katsura), should adopt male individuals (probably adults) from the former branches. While this solution would certainly have the advantage that no small child would have to be taken away from his parents in order to serve the highest good of the monarchy, it still has to remain very doubtful if a man who has been raised as a commoner and who had no close personal ties with his adopting family would ever be up to the difficult task of being a Japanese royal.

The New Year Greeting 2011 at the Imperial Palace (from left to right: Ayako of Takamado, Tsuguko of Takamado, Akiko of Mikasa, Hanako of Hitachi, Masahito of Hitachi, Princess Masako, Prince Naruhito)

The emperor as well as his two sons have married women from commoner families. In the last two generations of the imperial family, imperial children have been raised, although with support from imperial staff, mainly by their natural parents. Although there is no doubt that the family appreciates this state of things, this is not just a matter of personal preference of imperial family members. The imperial family is nowadays perceived by the public as a family in the commoner sense, with close ties, intimate knowledge of each other, and an emotional bond that cannot be fully described by the terms of loyalty and filial piety, but rather by the words “love,” “warmth,” and “tenderness.” In fact, this has grown to be an important part of their public image, and even occasional rumours about quarrels in the imperial family so far rather seem to serve to further humanize them. As anthropologist Takie Sugiyama Lebra puts it: “In the television age, the emperor appears to viewers relaxing in their living rooms foremost as a happy husband and father, a man totally devoid of the mystique surrounding the prewar throne.” Of course, in spite of this “homely” aspect of their image, there is another important role Japan´s royals have to play: they are living this seemingly private family life under constant public observation. And the needs of their public audience are somewhat contradictory: on one hand commoners want to be able to emotionally relate to their royals, on the other hand they expect them to be “special.”

While the imperial princesses have grown up in this atmosphere of “public family life” and have watched their parents observing all the little do’s and don’t's of a royal who is required to hit the sensitive balance between an excess of aloofness on one hand and a lack of dignity on the other, a commoner, even if he comes from a former collateral branch of the imperial family, can hardly ever acquire that innate knowledge of what is required of him. In fact, such an adoptee would not even meet the one condition that was imposed in former times even on adoption candidates for the nobility: he does not come from the same social class. As a consequence, he could hardly be expected to ever feel really at home in the position that has been granted him. Even if traditional knowledge about imperial life had been handed down in his family to the present generation, there is no doubt that this would always be information about pre-war imperial life which could hardly be of much value for him, considering how much the image and lifestyle of Japan’s royalty has changed since the war.

All things considered, one would have to conclude that those who propose adoption as a solution to the present crisis of the imperial family, willfully ignore the fact that the circumstances under which, in the past, this instrument did indeed prove useful and effective, have radically changed. Not only have the values and lifestyle of Japanese commoners undergone a fundamental transformation during the last two centuries, in particular, since the end of the war, but the same is also true for the emperor and his family. One cannot help feeling that it says a lot that when Shingo Haketa, grand steward of the Imperial Household Agency, visited Prime Minister Noda in October of last year, he did not just tell him to somehow solve the problem of the decreasing number of imperial family members, but explicity asked him to let the princesses remain in the family and let them create family branches of their own.

The Imperial Household Agency is notorious for its conservative views and politics, but, of course, its most important concern will always consist of protecting and preserving the survival of the imperial family. If even they go so far as to maintain that the support of the princesses is indispensable for the monarchy, maybe we had better believe them.

Acknowledgments
I am greatly indebted to Takie Sugiyama Lebra, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology of the University of Hawaii, for her book Above the Clouds – Status Culture of the Modern Japanese Nobility. The information it provides has been invaluable for the writing of this blog.
Collage by Kelly Lacroix, used with permission.
New Year greeting 2011 by Wikimedia Commons member Kounosu, used under Creative Commons licence.
Other photos, public domain.

Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon was born on 4 August 1900, the youngest daughter of the future 14th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne. She grew up during World War I, a war that claimed the lives of one of her brothers and several of her friends; her home was used as a convalescent hospital for wounded officers, whom she helped look after. Experiences like these left their mark on the young people who survived – the 1920s were a decade of parties, entertainment, and a determination to have fun and put the horrors of the war behind them. But although Lady Elizabeth was popular and joined in all the fun, she wasn’t one of the smoking, drinking, short-haired modern girls – photos show a wistful-looking young woman with an almost ethereal air.

Lady Elizabeth soon caught the attention of Prince Albert (“Bertie”), Duke of York, second son of George V and Queen Mary. He decided that she was the only woman in the world for him, and proposed marriage. Elizabeth, worried about the prospect of life in the fishbowl of the royal family, turned him down. Twice. He persisted. Eventually she relented, and in 1923 they were married. Two daughters were born, Princess Elizabeth in 1926 and Princess Margaret in 1930. The Duke, who had grown up in a famously dysfunctional family, with a terrifyingly stern father and a shy, emotionally repressed mother, finally had a happy family of his own. The Duchess provided the emotional support and warmth that had been missing in the Duke’s upbringing, and, as related in the recent movie The King’s Speech, she encouraged him to seek treatment for his stammer from the Australian speech therapist Lionel Logue (although this was done in the mid-1920s, not just before World War II as depicted in the movie). Her influence can also be seen in the abrupt departure, soon after their marriage, of the Duke’s mentor and friend Louis Greig from his service.

Coronation portrait of Queen Elizabeth by Sir Gerald Kelly

The relaxed, relatively low-key existence enjoyed by the York family came to an end in 1936, with the death of George V and the accession of the Duke’s elder brother Edward VIII (known in the family as David). David was a relentless moderniser who was impatient with the traditions that Bertie and their father held so dear. He preferred a jet-set existence with his flashy friends and was bored with the royal routine. And then there was Mrs Simpson. As it gradually became clear that David was besotted with Wallis Simpson and intended to marry her as soon as she’d divorced her second husband, and that the Establishment was not going to tolerate a twice-divorced Queen Consort,  and that David was prepared to abdicate rather than give her up, the Yorks had to face the prospect of becoming King and Queen, something that Bertie dreaded. Elizabeth, with her charm and easy manners, might not have been so appalled at the prospect for herself, but she knew what anguish her husband was suffering, and she knew that her 10-year-old daughter would eventually follow her father as monarch. She never forgave David and especially Wallis, and she could (and quite often did) hold grudges forever.

She had some disagreements with Queen Mary on the subject of her daughters’ education, feeling that a healthy country upbringing was more important than book learning (something that Princess Margaret reportedly never forgave her for), but when it became clear that Princess Elizabeth was going to be Queen one day, she didn’t object to her elder daughter receiving special lessons in constitutional history. The story of the royal governess, Marion Crawford, is well known – after years of devoted service (and some frustration with the Duchess’s rather cavalier attitude to education), she made the mistake of writing about her experiences with the princesses and selling her story to an American magazine. She immediately became a non-person to the royals and remained so for the rest of her life, another example of the Queen Mother’s ability to never forgive or forget.

Almost as soon as Bertie had become King George VI, Britain was preparing for another war with Germany. With Bertie’s experience in the Navy and Elizabeth’s bereavements during World War I, they were as keen as anyone else to avoid another war, giving their support to Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain as he looked for ways to come to an accommodation with Hitler – not realising, at that early stage, that Hitler wasn’t someone who compromised. Neither of them was best pleased when Chamberlain finally stepped aside and Winston Churchill – who had been a vocal supporter of Edward VIII during the run-up to the abdication – became Prime Minister. However, the Prime Minister and the King forged a close working relationship that continued throughout the war.

The King and Queen in Canada, 1939

Elizabeth, meanwhile, was doing her own part in the war effort. Londoners old enough to remember the war will still, 70 years later, heap praise on the King and Queen for visiting areas that had been bombed. The Queen refused to take her daughters to Canada, instead staying in London with the King while the princesses lived at Windsor Castle with their governess. After Buckingham Palace was bombed while the King and Queen were in residence, the Queen famously said, “I’m glad we’ve been bombed. It makes me feel I can look the East End in the face.” She raised the morale of the country, and, just as important, she kept her husband’s spirits up. Not for nothing did Hitler call her ”the most dangerous woman in Europe.”

But the stress of the war and decades of heavy smoking had broken down the King’s health. In the late 1940s and early 1950s he underwent surgery for sclerosis and (although he wasn’t told) lung cancer. Early in the morning of 6 February 1952 he died in his sleep at Sandringham, while Princess Elizabeth and her husband Philip were in Africa en route to Australia. Queen Elizabeth was shattered by the loss of her husband in his mid-50s. Even though it had appeared that he was heavily dependent on her, their partnership had grown and matured to one of mutual respect and dependence. She retired to her Scottish home at Birkhall and prepared for a lonely widowhood. However, Sir Winston Churchill had other ideas, and he persuaded her to come out of retirement and take her place in the royal family. Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother was back in business.

Almost immediately she was faced with a crisis, when Princess Margaret’s attachment to the divorced royal equerry Peter Townsend became common knowledge. Although the Queen Mother tended to ignore difficult issues in the hope that they’d go away (a characteristic affectionately known as “ostriching”), letters written at the time show that she was very concerned and supportive in private. She supported her younger daughter through the pain of ending the relationship, the problems associated with Margaret’s eventual engagement and marriage to a commoner (many of the European royal families didn’t attend the wedding), and her high-profile and messy separation and divorce in the 1970s, the first divorce of a senior royal in modern times.

After the coronation in June 1953, the Queen and Prince Philip went on a long tour of the Commonwealth, lasting several months. The Queen Mother took care of Prince Charles and Princess Anne while their parents were away, and this was the start of her very close and warm relationship with her eldest grandson. As Prince Charles was growing up, his relationship with his father was prickly, and he turned to the Queen Mother and to Philip’s uncle Earl Mountbatten of Burma for emotional support. The Queen Mother viewed Mountbatten with a degree of suspicion – he had been a great friend of the Duke of Windsor until the abdication, and he had very strong left-wing views, rather progressive ideas about sex and marriage, and a questioning and modernising approach to life that didn’t sit well with the Queen Mother’s traditional, right-wing views and her strong religious faith. She was afraid that he was influencing Prince Philip and trying to be the power behind the throne, and she worked behind the scenes to block his ambition. It may not be coincidence that after Mountbatten tried to sell Prince Charles on the idea of marriage to a Mountbatten granddaughter, the eventual Princess of Wales turned out to be the granddaughter of a great friend of the Queen Mother. The Queen must have had some interesting times while her mother and her husband were locking horns over the future direction of the royal family, whether it was the choice of school for Prince Charles (Philip won that one), the modernisation of Sandringham (the Queen Mother prevailed), the filming of the Royal Family documentary in 1969 (another win for Philip), or countless other issues.

Throughout the second half of the 20th century, the Queen Mother was one of the most high-profile and certainly the most popular of the royals (until Diana came along, at any rate). The Queen was admired and respected, even revered, but she wasn’t loved in the same way that her mother was loved. People wouldn’t have tolerated extravagance at Buckingham Palace, but for the most part they responded with resigned amusement to stories of high living and massive debts at Clarence House. After her marriage the Queen Mother never gave any interviews, but she had such an approachable manner that people felt they knew her anyway. She stayed active and performed royal engagements until well into her nineties, turning up at charity and military events, joining the rest of the family for major events, and greeting the crowds outside her home on her birthday every year. Her interest in horse racing, an interest she shared with the Queen, and her interest in art persisted until her death.

Statues of George VI and Queen Elizabeth

The Queen Mother lived into the era of Cool Britannia, an era she must not have had much sympathy for. The general attitude of the media during the Blair years was that royalty was an anachronism, and a royal centenarian was really nothing more than a living fossil. The BBC decided not to cover the celebrations of her centenary, and when she died on 30 March 2002, the BBC news anchor Peter Sissons was advised not to wear a dark suit and black tie to announce her death because, after all, she was just an old lady who was going to pop her clogs one of these days anyway.

The public had other ideas. People had been touched a few weeks earlier by the courage of the Queen Mother, old and ill, travelling from Sandringham to Windsor for the funeral of Princess Margaret, which was held on 15 February 2002, 50 years to the day after the funeral of George VI. There was widespread anger at the perceived lack of respect shown by the BBC when annoucing the Queen Mother’s death. When her coffin lay in state in Westminster Hall, hundreds of thousands of people filed past to pay their respects to Britain’s last Queen-Empress and sign books of condolence. Her grandsons, Prince Charles, Prince Andrew, Prince Edward, and Viscount Linley, took their turn standing guard over her coffin, a tribute whose origins lay in the Vigil of the Princes when George V’s four sons, including the Queen Mother’s husband, stood guard over his coffin as it lay in state in 1936. On the day of her funeral, it was estimated that over a million people were in the streets to watch the procession and pay their respects. After the funeral, she was taken to Windsor and interred along with her husband and younger daughter in St George’s Chapel.

The royal lady whose life spanned the entire 20th century has taken her place as one of the great Queen Consorts in our history, being an outstanding help to her husband as he led the country through difficult times. Even more than that, she spent half a century as the nation’s beloved grandmother. All the official titles she accumulated over her long life, and there were many, can be summed up in the unofficial title by which she is best known – the Queen Mum. She’s going to be a hard act to follow.

Collage by Kelly Lacroix, used with permission.
Coronation portrait, public domain.
The King and Queen in Canada, public domain.
Statues of George VI and Queen Elizabeth by Pam Frey and used under Creative Commons licence.

George Tupou V had been king since the death of his father, King Taufa’ahau Tupou IV, in September 2006. In November 2006 pro-democracy riots broke out in the capital city, with extensive property damage and several deaths. The king’s coronation was delayed until 2008 as a result, and took place shortly after the passage of pro-democracy legislation. He has been seen as a reformer and a supporter of the move from absolute to constitutional monarchy.

The eldest son of King Taufa’ahau Tupou IV and Queen Halaevalu Mata’aho, he was born on 4 May 1948 and was named crown prince in 1966, soon after his father’s accession in December 1965. He was educated in New Zealand and Britain, attending Oxford University and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst.

During his father’s reign, before the pro-democracy reforms, he held prominent positions in the government, including being responsible for foreign affairs. He also had many business interests. Once he became king he reigned for the most part as a constitutional monarch. As well as being known as a reformer, he was famous for his rather eccentric appearance in formal suits and top hat or pith helmet (and sometimes a monocle) and for using a London taxi cab as his preferred form of transport.

He never married (although he has one illegitimate daughter), and is succeeded by his brother, Tupoutoʻa Lavaka, who was at his bedside when he died. The new king’s eldest son, Prince ‘Ulukalala, now the crown prince, was due to marry his cousin Sinaitakala Fakafanua in May. The wedding will probably be postponed due to court mourning.

Update, 19 March: The funeral of King George Tupou V is scheduled for 28 March.

Collage by Kelly Lacroix, used with permission.

On Tuesday 28 February 2012, the famous auction house Sotheby’s announced it will auction one of the world’s most famous gems: the “Beau Sancy”, a 35-carat pear-shaped diamond once worn by Maria de’Medici at her coronation in 1610.

The Beau Sancy diamond, now in the possession of Prince Georg Friedrich, great-great-grandson of the last German Emperor, will be auctioned off on 15 May 2012 by Sotheby's in Geneva, Switzerland.

The diamond witnessed some 400 years of royal history, being passed between different royal families and many generations. Reason enough to take a closer look at the four centuries of royal romance, misfortune and politics throughout Europe.

The story of the Beau Sancy diamond started in the late 16th century. The diamond was bought by Nicolas de Harlay, seigneur de Sancy in 1570. He gave his name to two magnificent diamonds: the “Grand Sancy” (or simply “Sancy”), a pale yellow diamond of 55 carats, sold to James I of England in 1604, and the “Beau Sancy”, a 35 carat diamond which was sold to Henri IV of France, as a gift to his wife, Maria de’Medici, later that same year.

The Grand Sancy, like his smaller sibling, made its way through royal history. It was sold by James II of England to Cardinal Mazarin during his exile in France. Cardinal Mazarin bequeathed the gem to the French King, and it remained in the royal vaults until it was stolen during the French revolution. It resurfaced a few times, being bought in the early 19th century by a Russian nobleman, who resold it in the second half of that century to an Indian merchant, who again sold it. It is unknown who owned the Grand Sancy after the Indian merchant. The diamond appeared at the Paris Exposition in 1867, carrying a pricetag of 1 million francs. Then the gem disappeared again, until it was bought in 1906 by William Waldorf Astor, 1st Viscount Astor. The Astor family remained in possession of the diamond until the fourth Viscount Astor sold it to the Louvre in 1978.

Marie de'Medici, detail of the crown with the Beau Sancy

The history of the Beau Sancy, however, is even more impressive. The gem was bought by Henri IV of France as a gift to his wife, Maria de’Medici, who had long wanted the diamond. She had it placed on top of her crown for her coronation on 13 May 1610, the day before her husband was assassinated. The Queen had to flee France afterwards and sought shelter in the Netherlands, where she eventually had to sell all her jewellery to relieve her debts.

The Beau Sancy was acquired by Prince Frederick Hendrick of Orange-Nassau (1584-1647), in 1641. In the same year the diamond was used to seal the arrangement of the wedding of Frederick Hendrick’s son, William, later William II of Orange Nassau (1631-1660), to Mary Stuart, daughter of Charles I of England.

William III of England and the Netherlands (1650-1720)

After the death of her husband, Mary Stuart returned to England in order to support her brother Charles II in his fight for the throne. She had to pawn the Beau Sancy in 1662 to settle her debts. The diamond came back into the possession of the House of Orange-Nassau in 1677, following the wedding of  William III of Orange-Nassau (1650-1702) to Mary II Stuart, daughter of James II. In 1689, the couple ascended the throne of England. The Beau Sancy became part of the English royal jewellery collection, but returned to the Netherlands upon the death of William III in 1702.

The death of William III caused a succession dispute in the Netherlands. The English throne was inherited by Mary’s sister, Anne, but there were no direct heirs for the Dutch lordships and the principality of Orange. According to his will, William III left  his titles to John William Friso, an agnatic relative of the Princes of Orange, as well as a descendant of William the Silent through a female line. His rights to that inheritance were disputed by Prussian King Frederick I, also a descendant of William the Silent but through a more senior cognatic line. The dispute was ended with the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. The Beau Sancy, as part of the deal, and went to the Prussian royal family.

Frederick I of Prussia, the first Hohenzollern owner of the Beau Sancy diamond

The Beau Sancy has been in the hands of the Prussian royal family, the House of Hohenzollern, since 1713, and it was the largest gemstone in their collection. King Frederick I used it in the new royal crown of Prussia, but it also adorned the costume of many royal Prussian brides. The Hohenzolllern family later became the ruling family of Imperial Germany. Passing down from one generation to the next, it was part of the Imperial jewellery collection left behind in the Imperial palace in Berlin, when the German Emperor went into exile in 1918. After World War II, the German Imperial jewels were found by the British troops in a bricked up vault. They were returned to the Prussian Imperial family, and remained in their possession until now.

The auction house Sotheby’s has announced that the current owner, Prince Georg Friedrich (1976-), head of the Imperial House of Hohenzollern, has decided to sell the diamond. It will be auctioned on 15 May 2012 in Geneva, Switzerland. It is possible, then, that the Beau Sancy’s impressive royal connection ends here.

Pictures

Beau Sancy Collage, by Kelly Lacroix, used with permission.
Detail of Maria de’Medici in coronation robes, by Frans II Pourbus the Younger, 1610.
William III of England (1650-1720), by Sir Godfrey Kneller, 1680s.
Portrait of Friedrich I of Prussia (1657-1713), by Friedrich Wilhelm Weidemann, 1701.

It was both a surprise – because an announcement was not expected until the weekend – and a highly anticipated moment: the press conference called by Prince Friso’s doctors at the Landeskrankenhaus in Innsbruck, Austria, where they would give more information about the Prince’s condition. The press turned up en masse, the Royal family decided not to make any statements and didn’t attend.

At noon, two doctors and a translator arrived at the scene. The press conference was given in German, the translator repeated everything in Dutch, every few sentences.

The doctors explained that Prince Friso had been under the snow for some 25 minutes – a lot longer than the 15 or 20 minutes that circulated at first. He had suffered from a cardiac arrest due to prolonged lack of oxygen and had to be resuscitated. Resuscitation took around 50 minutes, “maybe too long”, as one of the doctors remarked. Altogether this may mean that the Prince was deprived of oxygen for over an hour. However, the doctors had hoped that his low body temperature – 32°C – would have protected his body from major damage. A body at low temperature can survive longer with less oxygen.

The doctors kept Prince Friso in a coma for 6 days, and then slowly started to heat up his body to normal temperature. They did an MRI scan yesterday, the first possible moment they wouldn’t be putting the Prince in danger by doing that. The scan showed that the Prince had suffered massive brain damage. The doctors are now unsure if Prince Friso will ever wake up from his coma. If he does, rehabilitation will take months, if not years.

The press conference ended in a shocked silence.

The royal family are now looking for a rehabilitation centre where Friso can be taken care of. It is unclear whether he will be transported to the UK, where he and his family live, or to the Netherlands.

Queen Beatrix has cancelled all her appointments for next week, even though she will travel back to the Netherlands during the weekend. Prince WillemAlexander, too, will make a short trip to the Netherlands next week. Both will return to Austria, where the whole family will remain for another week at least.

In the mean time, the Austrian police have started an investigation into the accident. They have interrogated Florian Moosbrugger, the friend who accompanied Prince Friso on his fatal descent. Moosbrugger was wearing a type of airbag anti-avalanche device, which kept him afloat. He managed to free himself, call the rescue services and started digging for the Prince immediately. The police are investigating if Moosbrugger can be indicted for negligence. This is a standard investigation after an avalance accident.

The Government Information Service (Rijksvoorlichtingsdienst) announced that the Dutch royal family “need[s] to come to terms with the Prince’s situation, and to reorganise their lives accordingly. The Royal Family therefore requests the media to give them the space to do so by respecting their privacy.”

Read the full declaration made by the doctors in German, Dutch or English here.

Just before 6.30 a.m. it was announced that Prince Daniel would talk to the press at 7 a.m. The Prince, smiling broadly, announced that the baby was a girl and had been born at 4.26 a.m., and that mother and daughter were both doing well. The baby was 51 centimetres long and weighed 3,280 grams (that’s 20 inches and 7 lb 3 oz for American readers!). The official notice at the Swedish Royal Court website is here. The King and Queen were not at the hospital for the birth but of course are expected to visit very soon; Princess Victoria had said earlier that the first photo of the baby would probably be taken by the King. The baby’s name is still not known, but an announcement is expected after the King holds a Cabinet meeting at which he will inform the Cabinet of the baby’s name and title. Earlier this month the Royal Court website posted a page entitled Tradition and Customs on the Occasion of a Royal Birth (here), which covers topics such as the Cabinet meeting and the royal salute following the birth of an heir.

The new princess is second in line to the Swedish throne after Crown Princess Victoria. She joins several other princesses of her generation who are in line to inherit their thrones: Princess Elisabeth of Belgium, Princess Amalia of The Netherlands, Princess Ingrid Alexandra of Norway, and Princess Leonor of Spain.  With the change in succession in Sweden to equal primogeniture in 1980, she will not be overtaken in the succession by a younger brother.

Update, 22 Feb: King Carl XVI Gustaf announced today that the new Princess’s name is Estelle Silvia Ewa Mary and her title is Duchess of Östergötland.

Prince Friso of Orange-Nassau, second son of Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, has been buried by an avalanche in Austria. The Prince was found after some 15 to 20 minutes, resuscitated at the scene and then taken to the university hospital in Innsbruck. His condition is critical but stable.

Official sources, such as the Rijksvoorlichtingsdienst or the Prime Minister of the Netherlands, have given no other information than that Prince Friso’s condition is “critical but stable”. Austrian media, more precisely the website oe24.at, were the first to give more details on his injuries. Around 3 pm (GMT +1) they claimed that the Prince suffered a basilar skull fracture and multiple traumatic injuries. Around 5 pm (GMT +1) they added that unconfirmed sources say Prince Friso is brain dead, the result of anoxia or a long and complete deprivation of oxygen.

Queen Beatrix and Princes Mabel, Prince Friso’s wife, arrived at the hospital in the course of the afternoon. Prince Willem-Alexander and Prince Constantijn, and their families, were still in the Netherlands and Belgium but are on their way to Austria. A government plane with Prince Willem Alexander and his family on board left Amsterdam around 7.30 pm, stopped in Brussels around 8 pm to collect Prince Constantijn and his family, and is now on its way to Austria.

Queen Beatrix and Prince Friso and his family are in Lech this week for their annual ski holiday. Over 50 cm of snow had fallen in the area over the past couple of days. This snow had fallen on an already icy snow layer, so it didn’t stick and there was a possibility that the fresh snow would start sliding. The roads into Lech had already been covered in an avalanche, cutting the place off of the rest of the world.

The local government had issued a category 4 risk of avalanches warning in the area. Category 5 is the highest avalanche risk category. Despite these circumstances, Prince Friso and three friends went out skiing. They decided to go off piste – while even skiing on piste would have been dangerous – and were caught in an avalanche of 30 metres wide and 40 metres long. One friend was wearing an avalanche safety system, some sort of ABS system which produces a big balloon protecting the skier from the snow. He managed to alert the rescue services, who arrived at the scene very quickly, and used detectors to find the Prince.

In the course of the afternoon, the doctors announced that they would only be able to make a prognosis in the course of the following days. They didn’t provide any details about the injuries the Prince sustained.

UPDATE:

The accident happened around noon near Litzen-Zugertobel. Austrian media report that Prince Friso was dragged along by the avalanche for some 40 metres, and buried under 50 cm of snow. Prince Friso was carrying a locating device which helped find him so quickly. The other man who was caught in the avalanche, Florian Moosbrugger, was wearing a sort of airbag device, which kept him afloat during the avalanche. this allowed him to free himself quickly. He alerted the rescue services and started looking for Prince Friso. He used his bare hands to free the Prince from the snow.

The mayor of Lech stated that the avalanche was probably caused by the skiers themselves. Which makes this whole situation very very sad.

Dutch Prime Minister Rutte said in a statement: “He is being cared for by the best doctors. We have all faith, because Austria has a very good reputation in medical care.” He also expressed his and the entire nation’s sympathy for the Queen and her entire family in this difficult time.

Austrian police have started an investigation into the ski accident of Prince Friso. They want to see if this was a case of negligence. This is standard procedure after a ski accident in Austria. One of the friends who went out skiing with the Prince, Florian Moosbrugger, also the owner of the hotel where the Royal Family are staying, has been interrogated in the matter.

Queen Beatrix herself, however, seems convinced that Florian Moosbrugger is not to blame for the accident. Moosbrugger’s mother informed the press that the Queen treated Florian like her own son, she gave him a big hug, showing that she didn’t think it was his fault at all.

Florian Moosbrugger has visited the Prince on Tuesday 21 February, together with Princess Mabel and Prince Constantijn.

We will be updating this blog as more news comes in. Also, check our Facebook and Twitter pages for updates.