Former journalist to head Danish royal court

Earlier this week the Danish royal court announced that Queen Margrethe II has appointed a new Lord Chamberlain, a position left vacant by Ove Ullerup’s decision to return to the Foreign Service after eleven years at court. The new Lord Chamberlain is rather surprisingly Michael Ehrenreich, a well-known journalist.
Ehrenreich, who is sixty years old, comes from the post of director of the Foreign Policy Society, which he took up only last year, but before that he worked as a journalist for 34 years, 21 of them (1982-2003) at the newspaper then known as Berlingske Tidende. He was that paper’s correspondent in London from 1984 to 1988 and in Washington from 1988 to 1993 and became editor-in-chief in 2001.
Two years later he became co-editor of Kristeligt Dagblad, a position he held until taking up his current job in 2013. In 2007 he published a biography of the then (and possibly future) US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, Hillary – En amerikansk historie.
While the Lord Chamberlain’s chair is often filled by diplomats or officers it is not the first time Queen Margrethe recruits someone from the media. In 1976 she hired Hans Sølvhøj, a former Social Democratic politician who was at that time director-general of the public broadcaster DR, as her second Lord Chamberlain. Hiring Sølvhøj was Prince Henrik’s idea and turned out to be an inspired choice, as Sølvhøj has been credited with making the monarchy more accessible and encouraging Queen Margrethe to let the world see her artistic side.
The new Lord Chamberlain will take up his post on 15 February, just in time for the state visit of the King and Queen of the Netherlands in mid-March and a series of grand events to celebrate Queen Margrethe’s 75th birthday in April.

My latest article: Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria

The Bavarian royal house of Wittelsbach is in my opinion one of the most interesting dynasties in history, and in the December issue of Majesty (Vol. 35, No. 12), which went on sale in Britain on Thursday, I write about the life of Crown Prince Rupprecht, the eldest son of the last King of Bavaria, who in the words of the historian Golo Mann was more suited to be king than several of his forebears. The revolution of 1918 prevented that, but the life of Rupprecht - a First World War commander who during the Second World War had to go into hiding while his family languished in concentration camps and who might have been not only King of Bavaria, but German Emperor and King of Britain - is nevertheless an interesting one.

Princess Kristine Bernadotte laid to rest

Flags flew at half mast at Drottningholm Palace outside Stockholm and at the Royal Lodge in Oslo today as Princess Kristine Bernadotte, who died suddenly on 4 November at the age of 82, was laid to rest. A private funeral service, conducted by the royal chaplain Michael Bjerkhagen, was held in Drottningholm Palace Church west of Stockholm before the late Princess was buried next to her husband, Prince Carl Bernadotte, and parents-in-law, Prince Carl and Princess Ingeborg of Sweden, in the Royal Burial Ground at Haga north of Stockholm.
The mourners were led by the Princess's brother, Jan E. Rivelsrud, and his family. Also present were her stepdaughter, Madeleine Kogevinas, the King and Queen of Sweden, the King and Queen of Norway, the Crown Princess and Prince Daniel of Sweden, the Crown Prince and Crown Princess of Norway, and Princess Märtha Louise of Norway and Ari Behn.
Princess Astrid of Norway, who was very close to her aunt-by-marriage, sadly seems to have been unable to attend, but two of her children, Alexander Ferner and Elisabeth Ferner, can be seen in photos published in the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet's report (external link).

My latest article(s): Obituaries of Princess Kristine Bernadotte

Following the death of Princess Kristine Bernadotte, the King's aunt, last week I have written two obituaries which have appeared in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten on Tuesday and in the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter today. The latter seems not to be available online, while the former may be read here (external link).

Princess Kristine Bernadotte to be buried on Saturday

The funeral of Princess Kristine Bernadotte, who died suddenly on 4 November at the age of 82, will take place on Saturday in Drottningholm Palace Church outside Stockholm. After the service the Princess will be laid to rest in the Royal Burial Ground at Haga in the same grave as her husband, Prince Carl Bernadotte, and her parents-in-law, Prince Carl and Princess Ingeborg.
The King and Queen of Sweden, the King and Queen of Norway, the Crown Princess and Prince Daniel of Sweden, the Crown Prince and Crown Princess of Norway, and Princess Märtha Louise of Norway and her husband Ari Behn will be present.

On this date: Grand Duke Jean's golden jubilee (sort of...)

Today might have been the golden jubilee of Grand Duke Jean of Luxembourg, who came to the throne when his mother, Grand Duchess Charlotte, abdicated on 12 November 1964. However, Grand Duke Jean himself abdicated in favour of his son Henri, the current Grand Duke, on 7 October 2000 and has therefore been able to enjoy his retirement for fourteen years. Grand Duke Jean, who will turn 94 in two months, retains the title of Grand Duke and can still be seen at official events from time to time.

At the road's end: Princess Kristine Bernadotte (1932-2014)

At 3 p.m. today a memorial service will take place in the Norwegian Sailors' Church in Calahonda in Spain for the King's aunt, Princess Kristine Bernadotte, who died suddenly in her home in Benalmádena on Tuesday, aged 82. The Princess rarely missed out on a family event in Norway and was in Oslo as a guest at the wedding of Princess Astrid's son Carl-Christian Ferner as recently as last month.
Kristine Rivelsrud was born in Eidsfoss in Vestfold, south of Oslo, on 22 April 1932. In 1960 she was hired as a secretary by Prince Carl Bernadotte, who had moved to Spain following his aquittal for his involvement in the so-called Huseby scandal two years previously. After he divorced his second wife in 1962, Kristine Rivelsrud was promoted to life partner, but it was not until 8 June 1978 that the couple married at the Swedish Embassy in Rabat in Morocco.
Prince Carl Bernadotte, né His Royal Highness Prince Carl (Junior) of Sweden, Duke of Ostrogothia was the only son of Prince Carl and Princess Ingeborg of Sweden, and as such the younger brother of Crown Princess Märtha of Norway, Queen Astrid of the Belgians and Princess Margaretha of Denmark. He forfeited his rights to the Swedish throne when he married a commoner, Countess Elsa von Rosen, in 1937, but received the title Prince Bernadotte (of the Belgian nobility) by his brother-in-law, King Léopold III of the Belgians. Thus Kristine Rivelsrud became a princess by marriage, and she was also listed last among the members of the Swedish royal family on the Swedish royal website.
However, she did not have much contact with the Swedish royal family, although King Carl Gustaf and Queen Silvia attended Prince Carl Bernadotte's 90th birthday in Oslo in January 2001 and his funeral in Danderyd in July 2003 and she was invited to the opening of an exhibition on the life of her sister-in-law Queen Astrid at the Royal Palace in Stockholm in 2005.
On the other hand she had a very close relationship with the Norwegian royal family, perhaps in particular with Princess Astrid (her exact contemporary). Prince Carl and Princess Kristine Bernadotte always spent Christmas with the Norwegian royal family until Prince Carl's declining health made the journey from Spain impossible, but after his death in June 2003 Princess Kristine returned as an annual Christmas guest. She was also very close to her brother, the hotelier Jan E. Rivelsrud, and his family, and enjoyed a good relationship with her stepdaughter Madeleine Kogevinas.
Princess Kristine Bernadotte looked rather grand, but she was in fact a very nice and likeable down-to-earth lady with a well-developed sense of humour.
Princess Kristine Bernadotte's funeral will take place (the date is yet to be announced) in the small Palace Church at Drottningholm Palace outside Stockholm, which was recently the venue for Princess Leonore's christening. She will be laid to rest in the Royal Burial Ground at Haga in the same grave as her husband and his parents.

On this date: The bicentenary of the Swedish-Norwegian union

200 years ago today Norway and Sweden formed a union of crowns when the Norwegian Parliament passed a revised Constitution and elected King Carl XIII of Sweden King of Norway. The union was formalised by the Act of Union the following year.
Despite what some people, perhaps particularly foreigners, seem to think, the union did not in any way mean that Norway became part of Sweden (or the other way around) or that the two countries became one state. It was in fact one of the loosest unions in history, the two countries sharing only the King and, as foreign policy was considered a royal prerogative, the foreign service. The relationship between the two countries can perhaps best be compared to the relationship between Britain and Hanover between 1714 and 1837.
The Swedes liked to refer to the two countries as "the United Kingdoms of Sweden and Norway" (the term seems to have been less popular in Norway), but the plural spells out the difference from "the United Kingdom of Great Britain and (Northern) Ireland".
The union was the brainchild of the Swedish Crown Prince Carl Johan, who hoped eventually to achieve an amalgamation of the two countries. In this he failed, but after his rather turbulent reign there followed what has subsequently been called "the happy days of the union". Clouds began to gather in the reign of Carl XV, and from the 1880s there were numerous conflicts and crisis until the Norwegian Parliament unilaterally deposed Oscar II on 7 June 1905 and Norway thereby withdrew from the union. Following negotiations between the two countries in Karlstad in the autumn, the union was formally dissolved on 26 October 1905 after both parliaments had ratified the Treaty of Karlstad and Oscar II abdicated the crown of Norway.
The union has subsequently had a very bad press in Norway, the bitterness of the political disputes having overshadowed the fact that it was also a time of economic and cultural blossoming.
Commemorations of the bicentenary have been fairly low-key, with conferences taking place yesterday and today and by a speech by the Speaker of Parliament at the start of today's parliamentary sitting.

On this date: Princess Margaretha's 80th birthday

Today is the 80th birthday of Princess Margaretha, Mrs Ambler, the eldest of the once-famous "Haga princesses", i.e. the four elder sisters of King Carl Gustaf of Sweden.
Princess Margaretha Désirée Victoria was born at Haga Palace on 31 October 1934 as the eldest child of Prince Gustaf Adolf and Princess Sibylla. Under the current Act of Succession she would have succeeded her grandfather as monarch in 1973, but as women were at that time entirely barred from succeeding to the Swedish throne Princess Margaretha's life has been a very private one.
That was not the case in her early years, when the four sisters - Margaretha, Birgitta, Désirée and Christina - were the focus of intense media interest and were hailed as idols for their generation of girls. Perhaps this unprecedented attention may have been at least part of the reason why Margaretha, like her sister Désirée, has chosen to live the rest of her life away from the eyes of the media and the general public.
Princess Margaretha was twelve years old when her father was killed in a plane crash in 1947 and seems to have struggled to cope with the tragedy, at one stage going to Denmark to live with her aunt Queen Ingrid. She also suffered from dyslexia and therefore left school at an early age, but trained as a seamstress and studied childcare.
After a well-publicised romance with the British socialite Robin Douglas-Home, Princess Margaretha married another Brit, the businessman John Ambler, on 30 June 1964. Her sister Désirée's wedding twenty-five days earlier had been a semi-state occasion held in the Cathedral of Stockholm, but Margaretha chose a simpler wedding in the parish church of Gärdlösa at Öland, near the summer palace Solliden.
Princess Margaretha, Mrs Ambler and John Ambler settled at Chippinghurst Manor in Oxfordshire, England. They rarely attended official events, but Princess Margaretha used to open the Christmas bazaar at the Swedish Church in London and the Amblers represented the King at the weddings of Princess Anne of Britain and Mark Phillips in 1973 and of Prince Andrew of Britain and Sarah Ferguson in 1986.
The couple had three children - Sybilla, Edward and James - but separated in 1994. However, the couple remained formally married until John Ambler's death in 2008.
Princess Margaretha now lives in a cottage in Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, but is usually always present for family events in Sweden and will celebrate her eightieth birthday privately in her native land.
On the occasion of the eightieth birthday of the eldest of the "Haga princesses" I have by the way written an article on the lives of the four sisters, which appears in the October issue of the British monthly magazine Majesty.

Swedish royal wedding on 13 June

The Swedish royal court has announced that the wedding of Prince Carl Philip and Sofia Hellqvist will as expected take place in the Palace Church in Stockholm on 13 June next year.
Given what was said at the time of the engagement about the wedding taking place in early summer 13 June was really the only option as the previous Saturday (6 June) is the National Day and the following Saturday (20 June) is midsummer's eve, which is a major holiday in Sweden.

Princess Astrid's youngest son marries

Last weekend Princess Astrid's youngest son, Carl-Christian Ferner, married Anna-Stina Slattum Karlsen, to whom he became engaged in January. The wedding was held in Ris Church in Oslo and the reception at Grand Hotel.
According to the magazine Se og Hør the wedding was attended by the King and Queen, the Crown Prince and Crown Princess, Princess Märtha Louise and Ari Behn. Princess Astrid and her husband Johan Martin Ferner, who at 87 is rarely seen in public, were of course also present along with the groom's siblings Cathrine, Benedikte, Alexander and Elisabeth with their partners and children. Also in attendance were Erling S. Lorentzen, Princess Ragnhild's widower, their three children Haakon, Ingeborg and Ragnhild, and the groom's great-aunt, Princess Kristine Bernadotte.
Carl-Christian Ferner, who will turn 42 this month, works for the family business Ferner Jacobsen, a men's clothing store of which he owns 46 % of the shares. Anna-Stina Slattum Ferner is born in 1984 and is a digital editor in the company Orkla.

Norwegian state visit to Burma

Interestingly, the King and Queen will pay a state visit to Burma from 1 to 3 December. This would have been unthinkable only a few years ago, but should be seen as part of the normalisation of relations with Burma after the retirement of the military junta and the slight improvements in the country's human rights situation. State visits are decided by the government, and the King and Queen will as always be accompanied by the Foreign Minister.
President Thein Sein of Burma paid an official visit to Norway at the end of February 2013. The visit was hosted by then Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg, but the President was also received by the King and the royal Palace.
Before packing their bags for Burma the King and Queen will play hosts to President Pranab Mukherjee of India, who will pay a state visit to Norway on 13 and 14 October. This will be the first state visit ever between Norway and India, and will also be the fourth incoming state visit this year, compared to none in 2013 and only one in 2012.

My latest article(s): Tuxen and Swedish princesses

The October issue of Majesty (Vol. 35, No. 10) went on sale on Thursday and includes two articles by me. The first one tells the story of the Danish artist Laurits Tuxen and his work for the royal courts of Denmark, Britain, Russia and Greece. Tuxen has been called "the last court painter" and brought an unusual sense of colour and vibrancy to the often rather stale art of portraying royals and ceremonial, but his many royal commissions also came to influence his career and reputation in an unfortunate manner.
The second article deals with the four sisters of King Carl Gustaf - Margaretha, Birgitta, Désirée and Christina - who were the epitome of royal glamour fifty years ago. The article is published on the occasion of Princess Margaretha's eightieth birthday at the end of October and chronicles how the lives of the four sisters have taken very different directions.

Walburga Habsburg Douglas loses Parliament seat

A week after the Swedish general election all the votes have now been counted and the distribution of Parliament seats between parties and candidates finalised. Some of my readers may be interested in knowing that Walburga Habsburg Douglas, the former Archduchess of Austria-Hungary and daughter of that country's last crown prince, Otto von Habsburg, was not re-elected to the Swedish Parliament.
Walburga Habsburg Douglas was first elected to Parliament for the Conservative party in 2006 and was re-elected in 2010. In this year's election she was demoted to the eighth position on her party's list for the county of Södermanland, meaning that she would need a lot of personal votes to supersede those ahead of her on the list. However, as the Conservatives won three seats from Södermanland and Walburga Habsburg Douglas received only 117 votes she will be neither an MP nor a substitute (i.e. one of those who step in if an MP is absent or renounces his or her seat). Her parliamentary career thus seems to have come to an end.

My latest article: When Christian Frederik met Carl Johan

History is full of great adversaries who never met face to face - Elizabeth I of England and Mary Queen of Scots, Napoléon I and Wellington, Churchill and Hitler, to mention a few examples - and it is a little-known fact that Christian Frederik and Carl Johan, the two great rivals in the struggle about Norway 200 years ago, actually met on three occasions. This is the topic of a short article I have written in connection with this year's independence bicentenary. The article appears in Historie, no 2 - 2014, which went on sale last week.

At the road's end: Prince Nicholas Romanov (1922-2014), head of the Romanov Family Assocation

It has been reported that Prince Nicholas Romanov, the head of the Romanov Family Assocation, died on Monday, shortly before his 92nd birthday. A great-great-grandson of Emperor Nikolay I of Russia, Nicholas Romanov was the eldest son of Prince Roman Petrovich of Russia and Countess Praskovia Sheremeteva.
Born on 26 September 1922, he grew up in France and Italy, where he actively opposed the Fascist regime during the Second World War. He eventually acquired Italian citizenship and married an Italian, Countess Sveva della Gherardesca, in 1951. The couple had three daughters.
Nicholas Romanov worked as a businessman and farmer, eventually settling in Switzerland. He paid his first visit to Russia in 1992, the year after the fall of the Soviet Union.
In 1979 he was co-founder of the Romanov Family Assocation, which organises male-line descendants of the House of Romanov. Nicholas Romanov was vice president from its founding until he succeeded Prince Vasili Alexandrovich in 1989.
Under the rules in force when Russia was a monarchy Nicholas Romanov, being born of an unequal marriage, would have had no succession rights. However, the Romanov Family Assocation has, if I understand it correctly, claimed that these rules have been so to speak suspended since the execution of the last Emperor in 1918, claiming that the rights of the princes who contracted unequal marriages were not renounced as there was no emperor to demand their renuncations.
Nicholas Romanov's claim to head the Romanovs was disputed by Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna, who assumed the headship of the imperial family upon the death of her father Vladimir Kirillovich in 1992, claiming that there were no male dynasts left.

Social Democrats win power in Sweden

Fredrik Reinfeldt has announced his resignation as Prime Minister of Sweden and leader of the Conservative party after having taken a severe beating in Sunday's general election, whose only real winner is the right-wing extremist party the Sweden Democrats. The Speaker of Parliament will ask the leader of the Social Democrats, Stefan Löfven, to form a new government.
Given the election results, Löfven's task will not be an easy one. His party won 31.2 %, a gain of only 0.4 % from its result in the 2010 election, which was its worst since 1911. His prospetive coalition partner, the Green Party, won 6.8 % of the votes, back 0.4 % from 2010, while the third party of the left, the Left Party, gained 0.1 % and achieved 5.7 %. Thus the left wing's total gain was a mere 0.1 %.
Yet the left wins power as all of the four parties which have governed Sweden since 2006 lost support. The Conservative party backed no less than 6.7 %, winning only 23.2 % of the votes. The Liberal People's Party received 5.4 % (-1.7), the Christian Democrats 4.6 % (-1 %) and the Centre Party 6.1 % (-0.4 %).
What is lost by the four governing parties is won by the Sweden Democrats, who achieved 12.9 %, a gain of 7.2 %. The Sweden Democrats thus hold the parliamentary balance, but all the other parties have made it clear that they will under no circumstances co-operate with the extremists, whose roots lie in Nazism.
This creates a very difficult parliamentary situation, as the new government, which is widely expected to consist of the Social Democrats and the Green Party, will not be able to form a majority with neither the Left Party nor the Centre Party nor the Liberal People's Party. Indeed the support of either the Left Party and the Centre Party or the Left Party and the Liberal People's Party or the Centre Party and the Liberal People's Party will be needed, but the Centre Party and the Liberal People's Party have made it clear that they will not support a Social Democratic government. However, if the "established" parties are to continue to isolate the Sweden Democrats, some sort of co-operation across the line that divides the two blocks will be necessary.
If Stefan Löfven, a former trade union boss who has until now never been an MP or a minister, succeeds in forming a coalition with the Green Party it will be the first time that party enters government and the first time since the 1950s that the Social Democrats govern with another party. Another option is that the Social Democrats form a government alone, but dependent of support from some of the smaller parties.
There is also a theoretical possibility that an impossible parliamentary situation may lead to Parliament being dissolved and an extra election called before 2018, but this has not happened after the introduction of the new Constitution in 1974.

Elizabeth, Queen of independent Scotland?

In a week from today, the Scots will vote over whether Scotland should become an independent country. While the no campaign has had a clear lead for months, the opinion polls are now so close that the dissolution of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a real possibility. If a majority of the Scots votes yes, Scotland will become independent on 24 March 2016. If they vote no, we have now been told that Scotland will immediately be offered greater autonomy within the United Kingdom.
A yes vote will obviously have great consequences, so it is rather surprising that many crucial issues remain unclear, most significantly the financial issue. While the Scottish government insists that Scotland will maintain the pound as its currency, the leaders of the three main British parties have insisted Scotland will not be allowed to do so, and should they change their mind a currency union between Scotland and Britain would clearly involve some sovereignty being ceded. It is also quite surprising that the British government insist they have no plans for what will happen if Scotland votes yes.
The question of what will happen to the monarchy has on the other hand been settled, although it includes unanswered questions. The referendum is about the dissolution of the parliamentary union of 1707, not the union of crowns of 1603. Therefore a vote in favour of independence means that Scotland and the remainder of Britain will revert to the previous arrangement, i.e. a personal union between two independent states. This is roughly the same arrangement as the union between Britain and Hanover between 1714 and 1837 and the union between Norway and Sweden between 1814 and 1905.
This means that Elizabeth II will become Queen of Scotland or of Scots, the latter (and, I believe, older) title apparently being favoured by the Scots. She will obviously drop the numeral in Scotland, as she is the first Scottish monarch of that name. This will put Scotland in the same position as Australia, Canada and numerous other kingdoms of which Elizabeth II is queen, i.e. of having a monarch resident abroad, although I can imagine the Scots will expect her to come to Scotland more frequently. As Queen of an independent Scotland Queen Elizabeth would be bound to take constitutional advice from the Scottish government, which may mean that she could at some stage receive conflicting advice from the Scottish and British governments in her roles as head of state of both countries (the union kings of Norway and of Sweden would have had much to say about such a scenario). One possibility is that her functions as Queen of Scotland is delegated to a governor general or a similar office when she is not in residence in Scotland, as is the case in her other kingdoms, but this has not been officially discussed.
There is also the issue of how long such a personal union would last. A YouGov poll conducted on 2-5 September found 54 % to be in favour of keeping the British monarch as head of state in the event of independence, while 31 % favoured an elected head of state and 15 % were undecided.
The same opinion poll found, for the first time, a majority to be in favour of independence, which has unleashed what seems like panic in London and some rather desperate calls for Queen Elizabeth to intervene and speak out in favour of the union. At the time of her silver jubilee in 1977, when a referendum on devolution of powers within the United Kingdom was coming up, the Queen for once indicated her personal opinion in an address to the Houses of Parliament, saying: "I number Kings and Queens of England and of Scotland, and Princes of Wales among my ancestors and so I can readily understand these aspirations. But I cannot forget that I was crowned Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Perhaps this Jubilee is a time to remind ourselves of the benefits which union has conferred, at home and in our international dealings, on the inhabitants of all parts of this United Kingdom".
On Tuesday the conservative Daily Telegraph used its editorial to call on Queen Elizabeth to speak out in favour of the union. This was rejected outright by a spokesperson who insisted: "The sovereign's constitutional impartiality is an established principle of our democracy and one which the Queen has demonstrated throughout her reign. As such the monarch is above politics and those in political office have a duty to ensure that this remains the case. Any suggestion that the Queen would wish to influence the outcome of the current referendum campaign is categorically wrong. Her Majesty is firmly of the view that this is a matter for the people of Scotland". It would in my opinion have been unwise if she had indeed intervened. It would have jeopardised the monarchy's political neutrality, and might also have alienated it from roughly half the Scottish people. It would also have undermined the Queen's standing, as it would have made a yes vote a personal defeat for Elizabeth II.

Royal jewels: Princess Astrid’s aigrette(s)

In recent years it seems Princess Astrid, who is now 82, has more or less given up wearing her larger tiaras, i.e. the Vasa diadem of her mother and the diamond and turquoise coronet of her great-grandmother, Queen Alexandra of Britain. These days she mostly chooses lighter pieces, primarily the gold bandeau of her great-grandmother Queen Sophie and an aigrette that is one of the most versatile and peculiar pieces of royal jewellery.
The latter is really two different pieces of jewellery; in other words the base is the same, but there are two different ornaments that can be attached to it.
The version most frequently worn – most recently for the state banquet during the Israeli state visit in May – has a pair of diamond Mercury wings that tremble as the wearer moves. The other version – seen at the state banquet for the President of Estonia last week – has a ruby set in diamonds in the shape of a flower from which two long-stemmed flowers of diamonds and rubies emerge.
When I wrote my biography of her, which was published seven years ago, Princess Astrid told me she is always teased when she wears the aigrette in is latter setting, “people say they suppose one [flower] receives London and the other Moscow”.
The Victorian and Edwardian eras were the heyday of aigrettes, which could be worn as a head ornament with ostrich feathers (Princess Astrid says she has not contemplated that look). Princess Astrid’s aigrette originally belonged to her grandmother, Queen Maud, whose jewels were divided between her three grandchildren in the autumn of 1968. Unlike the Vasa tiara and the turquoise coronet it will not pass to the King upon Princess Astrid’s death, but be inherited by her children.

Duchess of Cambridge pregnant with second child

The British royal court has announced that the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, aka Prince William of Britain and his wife Catherine, are expecting their second child. The announcement seems to come because the Duchess, as last time, suffers from severe morning sickness and therefore had to bow out from a visit to Oxford today. The announcement does not say when the child is expected.
The child will be fourth in line to the British throne and will hold the style of title of Royal Highness and Prince(ss) of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (styled "HRH Prince(ss) _____ of Cambridge" within Britain). This follows from Queen Elizabeth II's decision of 31 December 2012 to alter the previous rules under which the royal title was restricted to the eldest son of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales .