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The reason behind Philip’s so-called gaffes? He’s too German.

Could this really be a possibility? According to a recent BBC report, the German translation of a Paddington Bear book reveals extremely different cultural norms. There is a distinct divide between what Germans consider frank and what the British consider rude.

In A Bear Called Paddington, an exchange of small talk occurs in the English original: “‘Hello Mrs. Bird,’ said Judy. ‘It’s nice to see you again. How’s the rheumatism?’ ‘Worse than it’s ever been’ began Mrs. Bird.”

What the British see in this passage is polite small talk; Germans see it as deceitful and/or unnecessary. The passage was cut from the German version of the book altogether.

The German language doesn’t even have an expression for “small talk”, according to Professor Juliane House, of the University of Hamburg. The professor studied people in control groups engaging in social situations and found that Germans were much less likely to talk about the weather or ask after someone’s health. They were far more direct in their questions, something that the British would perhaps consider rude or blunt.

On the British side, Professor Derek Bousfield, the head of linguistics at the University of Central Lancashire, says that “German directness and British indirectness is the source of much miscommunication”.

Is one culture more rude than the other? No, just different.

So the Duke of Edinburgh – who has turned many a hair white with some of his remarks – may simply have an abundance of Germanic bluntness. He is the polar opposite of Her Majesty.

Right behind him is his daughter, HRH Princess Anne. The Princess Royal’s abrupt comments and insistence on working formality certainly keeps things clear. Tony Blair’s wife is said to have asked Anne to call her “Cherie”. Anne swiftly replied: ‘Actually, let’s not go that way. Let’s stick to Mrs. Blair, shall we?’

At least you’ll always know where you stand.

Germany contains some of my favorite castles, and being part German, I’ve always had an interest in the country’s royal history. So I am especially excited now with the announcement of the engagement between Prince Georg Friedrich of Prussia and Sophie, Princess von Isenburg.
Photo © Preussen.de

Prussia was a German kingdom and the leading state in the German Empire, originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. Though the monarchy was abolished in 1918, the members of the Hohenzollern family never relinquished their claims to the thrones of Prussia and the German Empire.

Where does Prince Georg Friedrich fit into all of this? Like most royals in Europe, he is descended from Queen Victoria. His family’s backstory is also as colorful and historic as the great Queen herself.

England and Germany Unite

Princess Victoria (Vicky), the eldest child of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, met her future husband in 1851. The young Friedrich Whilhelm of Prussia (Fritz), eldest son of the Kaiser, had come to England with his parents to visit Albert’s Great Exhibition in London. Though only a child at the time, Vicky was entranced with Fritz. Throughout the tour of the Exhibition, the gregarious Vicky was more than happy to show off her knowledge to the royal guests, hoping to impress Fritz.

Fritz was ten years Vicky’s senior, and since the princess was only 11, any possibility of romance at that time was out of the question. Prince Albert and Queen Victoria were willing to bide their time, since they knew that a match between the two was going to be a boon to both England and Germany.

Prince Albert was born a prince of the German Duchy of Coburg, and always dreamed of a united liberal Germany. He felt that a marriage between his eldest daughter and the democratically-minded son of the Kaiser was a step towards making that dream come true. The pair could help establish a constitutional monarchy with Parliamentary democracy once Fritz came to the throne. Both Albert and Victoria agreed that any betrothal had to be put on hold until Vicky was older, but they kept Fritz and his family close so that an eventual match could be arranged.

A few years later Fritz was invited to Balmoral to spend time with Vicky and the Royal Family. It was here that he proposed to the princess, who was now 14 years old. The Queen made sure that they waited until Vicky was at least 17 years of age before the engagement was publicly announced, and on May 19th, 1857 the world was told of the impending wedding.

The following January Vicky and Fritz were united in marriage. It was strikingly different from the marriages of that era. Royals were matched only for power and political gain, but Vicky and Fritz truly loved each other.

Their children numbered eight in all, but two died in childhood from illnesses. The heir, Prince Wilhelm, was born with a disability due to a difficult breech birth. His left arm was rendered useless and hung limply at his side. Many biographers have stated that this caused Wilhelm’s emotional development to be stunted, but this was only partly the case. Vicky, devastated that she brought a less than perfect heir into the world, did everything she could to coddle and protect Wilhelm. At the same time, she sharply criticized him and strapped him into painful gear that was meant to help strengthen his arm. This was a traumatic experience for the future Kaiser, who would forever attempt to conceal his weakness with a ferocious pugnacity.

When they finally became Emperor and Empress, Vicky and Fritz had precious little time to implement any real changes. Fritz died from cancer of the larynx three months into his reign. Upon his passing, Vicky was left alone and devoid of support or influence. The new Kaiser Wilhelm II was crowned, every inch the egotistical, manipulative, and dangerous autocrat.

Wilhelm was convinced that his cousins George and Nicholas (King of England and Tsar of Russia, respectively) were plotting against him. After fighting his own relations across Europe, he headed into exile in the Netherlands, never to see the throne again. He had hope that the monarchy would be restored with Adolf Hitler’s new regime, but when he learned of the Night of the Long Knives and Kristallnacht, the ex-Kaiser was wary of the power-hungry man and his Nazis.

“I have just made my views clear to Auwi [Wilhelm's fourth son] in the presence of his brothers. He had the nerve to say that he agreed with the Jewish pogroms and understood why they had come about. When I told him that any decent man would describe these actions as gangsterisms, he appeared totally indifferent. He is completely lost to our family …”

Wilhelm died at age 82 in 1941. He was buried in a mausoleum in the grounds of Huis Doorn, his home in exile.

Today

Georg Friedrich Ferdinand, Prince of Prussia, was born June 10th, 1976 and is the current head of the Imperial House of Hohenzollern. He succeeded his grandfather, Prince Louis Ferdinand I of Prussia in 1994 at age 18. German law does not officially recognize the existence of any princely titles but, under German civil law, former titles are considered to be part of a person’s surname. As such, his legal name is Georg Friedrich Ferdinand Prinz von Preußen.

On January 21st, 2011, Georg Friedrich announced his engagement to Princess Sophie of Isenburg. The wedding is scheduled to take place in Potsdam sometime in 2011, during the celebrations to mark the 950 years of the House of Hohenzollern.

Line of Descent from Queen Victoria

Queen Victoria (great-great-great-great grandmother)
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Princess Victoria (great-great-great grandmother)
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Kaiser Wilhelm II (great-great grandfather)
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William, German Crown Prince (great grandfather)
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Louis Ferdinand, Prince of Prussia (grandfather)
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Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia (father – died 1977)
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Georg Friedrich

Reading

- Wikipedia: Victoria, Princess Royal and Wilhelm II, German Emperor
- Full text of “Letters Of The Empress Frederick”
- Book Review: An Uncommon Woman

An Uncommon Woman – The Empress Frederick: Daughter of Queen Victoria, Wife of the Crown Prince of Prussia, Mother of Kaiser Wilhelm

You will feel great sympathy towards Vicky, the Empress Frederick, who was an unfortunate hostage to the intrigues of the German court. Sympathy will soon give way to awe at her courage and determination to do her best while having to perform the impossible: being all things to all people…

Read more…

Love royal history? Then here’s a great book for you – the true story of Empress Friedrich of Prussia, formerly the Princess Royal of England. Her story brings together the English and the German thrones, but then unwittingly rips them apart (as seen at Amazon.com).

An Uncommon Woman – The Empress Frederick: Daughter of Queen Victoria, Wife of the Crown Prince of Prussia, Mother of Kaiser Wilhelm

You will feel great sympathy towards Vicky, the Empress Frederick, who was an unfortunate hostage to the intrigues of the German court. Sympathy will soon give way to awe at her courage and determination to do her best while having to perform the impossible: being all things to all people.

Vicky was seen as the catalyst for change in Germany. Her parents, Queen Victoria and Prince Albert did not like the autocratic, militaristic way in which Emperor Wilhelm I was running Prussia. Instead, they visualized a united German nation with a government much like that of England. Their plan was to sow seeds of liberalism and constitutional monarchy through their daughter and her marriage to Wilhelm’s son, Prince Frederick (Fritz). In preparation for the eventual match, Vicky was schooled in politics and German life by Prince Albert. Eventually, she and Fritz would be Emperor and Empress of Prussia, and could bring about German unity.

Little did Vicky know that upon arriving in Berlin, she was at a disadvantage from the start.

As the daughter of Queen Victoria, she was encouraged to retain her Englishness yet was expected to be a Prussian wife and princess. Her efforts to raise her eldest son Willy as Prince Albert had raised her backfired. Her tendency to over-criticize (a trait passed on from Victoria) turned the young Wilhelm away, and he grew up under his thoroughly Prussian grandfather Wilhelm. Otto von Bismarck had seen his own chance to manipulate the future emperor, and along with the groveling royal court, Willy was turned into a bombastic power fanatic.

Her relationship with Fritz was not seen as loving, but as an English princess scheming to Anglicize the House of Hohenzollern. Vicky was painted as “die Englanderin”, unfaithful to Germany and a demon on the shoulder of her husband, whom she ‘manipulated’.

Hopes that Fritz’s mother, Empress Augusta, would watch over Vicky were dashed. Augusta was known to be very liberal and free-thinking, unusual for royal women of the time. In her they thought they had an ally, but both the Queen and Vicky would be sorely disappointed. The once-progressive Augusta had seen her marriage to Emperor Wilhelm unravel over the years, and as a result she became a bitter, self-absorbed woman. She gave Vicky little support in her new role.

When they finally became Emperor and Empress, Vicky and Fritz had precious little time to implement any real changes. Fritz died from cancer of the larynx three months into his reign. Upon his passing, Vicky was left alone and devoid of support or influence. Your heart cries at the unfairness of brilliant minds wasted, while Willy becomes Kaiser Wilhelm II – egotistical, manipulative, and dangerous.

Thankfully, Vicky did not live to see the destruction of the Hohenzollern dynasty when Wilhelm II pulled Germany and England into a devastating world war. After fighting his own relations across Europe, he headed into exile, never to see the throne again. Albert’s catalyst did indeed create a change, but not in the way he had expected. Germany would be unified, but the reigning royal house would fall from power, never to recover.

MandysRoyalty.org

Princess Tatiana Von Metternich, who died at Schloss Johannisberg, her home in Germany, on July 26 aged 91, was the widow of Prince Paul Alfons, last Prince von Metternich-Winneburg; she was one of the most beautiful women of her day, highly cultivated and well known in international society.

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