February 22nd, 2012
Mandy
Image via Wikipedia
HRH The Prince of Wales and HRH The Duchess of Cornwall will be begin their tour of Scandinavian countries in late March, and their first stop will be Norway. The tour marks the start of Their Royal Highnesses’ official overseas celebrations of The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee.
King Harald and Queen Sonja will host the couple during their stay in Norway. Charles and Camilla will perform official duties which include visiting Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg, attending a banquet at the Royal Palace in Oslo, and visiting the Nobel Peace Center to meet the survivors from the 2011 Utøya island massacre.
This tour will also be a time to visit with family – Charles’ great-grandfather was the brother of Harald’s grandmother (King George V was the brother of Princess Maud of Wales, who later became Queen of Norway).
After Norway, the British royals will visit Sweden. It is highly likely that the couple will get a chance to meet the new heir to the Swedish throne – Crown Princess Victoria is due to give birth in the early days of March. Though the prince has met King Carl XVI Gustaf, this will be Charles’ first official visit to Sweden.
The Windsors are also connected to the Bernadottes of Sweden through Gustaf VI Adolf, who was married first to Princess Margaret of Connaught (a granddaughter of Queen Victoria) and then to Princess Louise of Battenberg (the sister of Lord Louis Mountbatten).
The next stop will be Denmark to pay a visit to Queen Margrethe II, another family member. Like Elizabeth II, Queen Margrethe is celebrating a Jubilee this year – 2012 marks her 40th year on the Danish throne. She is related to the British royal family through her grandmother, Princess Margaret of Connaught. Charles was previously in Denmark in 2009, and his son William, along with wife Catherine, visited Copenhagen and met with Crown Prince Frederik to view UNICEF relief operations in November 2011.
The tour will take place from March 20th to 27th.
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Congratulations to TRH Prince Joachim and Princess Marie of Denmark. The princess gave birth to a girl, the first for the couple.
Read more here…
Edited to add: The baby girl is 6.4 pounds and 19 inches long. From the official DRF website.
Countess Alexandra of Frederiksborg, along with her husband, Martin Jorgensen, joined the Danish Royal Family to celebrate the jubilee of Queen Margrethe II. The Queen has been on the Danish throne for 40 years – a “ruby” jubilee.
Resplendent jewels and gowns glimmered brightly during the gala performance at the Concert Hall in honor of Margrethe last Saturday (1-14) evening. Alexandra arrived in brilliant red, topped off by her Alexandrine Diamond Drop Tiara (Queen Margrethe gave the tiara to her then-daughter-in-law as a wedding present. Alexandra kept the tiara after her divorce from Prince Joachim).
Members of the family in attendance for the concert included:
- Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary
- Prince Joachim and his sons Nikolai and Felix (Marie remained at home with little Henrik)
- The Queen’s sisters, Princess Benedikte (w/ husband Prince Richard of Sayn-Wittgenstein-Berleburg) and Queen Anne-Marie (w/ husband the former King Constantine)
- The Queen’s nieces and nephews from the Berleberg family and Greek royal family
- The Rosenborgs, cousins of the Queen
Other dignitaries included Danish government officials and the heads of state for the Scandinavian countries: the President of Finland, King Harald and Queen Sonja of Norway, King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia of Sweden, and Crown Prince Haakon and Crown Princess Mette-Marit of Norway (see the full list).
Crown Princess Mary must have scored major brownie points with her mother-in-law, Denmark’s Queen Margrethe II.
The Queen is known for her beehive-inspired bouffants (as seen on the royal website). Princess Mary was photographed sporting her own brand of beehive for the annual New Year’s banquet, as reported by the blog The Royal Order of Sartorial Splendor.
Mary’s hairdo was surmounted by a diamond and ruby tiara in the form of leaves and berries. It was a tiara once worn by Queen Ingrid of Denmark, Margrethe’s mother.
Prince Christian, heir to Denmark’s throne, has started his first day of school.
Below, the prince poses with his parents outside their home at Amalienborg Palace, just before heading off to the Tranegard School.
It seems like only yesterday the little chubby-cheeked prince was beginning his first day of nursery school. How time flies!
Everyone knows Kate Middleton, now the Duchess of Cambridge. The gorgeous Queen Rania of Jordan ranks high in the royal elite, and Queen Elizabeth II is a legend. Which modern-day royals rank in your top 10? Let’s hear the nominations as we research the hard-working and history-worthy royals across the world.
Princess Nathalie zu Sayn-Wittgenstein-Berleburg and Alexander Johannsmann have married today in the evangelic Stadtkirche in Bad Berleburg, Germany.
Princess Nathalie is the niece of Queen Margrethe II of Denmark; Nathalie’s mother is Margrethe’s sister Benedikte.
I truly love the tiara Nathalie wore. It is the Khedive of Egypt Cartier Tiara, originally a wedding gift from the Khedive of Egypt to Princess Margaret of Connaught. The Princess married the future King Gustav VI Adolf of Sweden. When she died, the tiara was inherited by her daughter Princess Ingrid, who married into the Danish Royal Family to become Queen Ingrid of Denmark.
All three of Queen Ingrid’s daughters have donned it for their weddings – Margrethe, the eldest, who married Count Henri de Monpezat; Benedikte, who wed Richard, Prince of Sayn-Wittgenstein-Berleburg; and Anne-Marie, who married Constantine, the ex-King of Greece. Nathalie’s elder sister, Alexandra, wore it for her 1998 wedding.
Today the tiara officially belongs to Queen Ingrid’s youngest daughter, Queen Anne-Marie. Click here to see the tiara on all three sisters at the wonderful Royal Jewels of the World blog.
It seems that Princess Nathalie’s bridesmaid was wearing the same dress as Theodora of Greece. Princess Theodora wore the single-strap flowing gown for her brother Nikolaos’ nuptials last summer.
