If you are like me your answer to the above question was--not much. We have the perfect remedy to that problem. Join us on Tues., Oct. 20 at 7:00pm in the Library Lecture Hall where Sheila Bolsover will be lecturing on the history of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Do not fear that this will be a dull, dry history lesson because Ms. Bolsover is known as a spirited and witty raconteur. This is a free lecture generously hosted by The Friends of the Dover Public Library. I recently interviewed Ms. Bolsover on her interest in the topic, and here is what she had to say:How did you become interested in the region of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha?
I became interested in Sachsen Coburg und Gothen because my brother lives there. He married a German. I knew nothing about the region, until I visited him for the first time several years ago. One day we were on a bike ride around the beautiful Bavarian countryside, and he casually pointed to a beautiful building in the woods nearby and told me it was Rosenau, where Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, had been brought up. Suddenly my history lessons made sense. I sat on a bench that Victoria used to sit on when she came to Coburg. In fact, she always said that she wished she was not royal because she would love to have been a hausfrau living at Rosenau. She used to go there a lot and live as an ‘ordinary’ person (Hrmph!!). Personally, I do not think that would have lasted long, not when you are used to minions doing all sorts of things for you. She stayed at the Schloss Ehrenburg in the town centre when she came to visit, as well.
There is a gothic castle on the hill overlooking Coburg (called a Veste in Deutschland), and it is not the kind of regularly shaped Norman castles we are used to in England. It is referred to as The Crown of Franconia, and when you see it from below it does look like a diadem on the top of the hill. It is very beautiful.
According to the House Law of the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha the full title of the Duke was: We, Ernst, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Jülich, Cleves and Berg, also Angria and Westphalia, Landgrave in Thuringia, Margrave of Meissen, Princely Count of Henneberg, Count of the Mark and Ravensberg, Lord of Ravenstein and Tonna, et cetera. Can you give us some background on this? (I am very happy with my 3 word title!)
It is quite common for the German princes to have all kinds of lands all over Germany and each bit of land comes with a title of some sort and if not – ve maken von oop! I have just read a history of the German speaking peoples and really I am surprised that they had so much history! I thought England was the champion of that, and of course when we were at school in UK the European countries were all bundled together under the euphemism of ‘the continent’. I believe that the Almanach de Gothe was required reading in every German noble’s schoolroom every day, with tests on Friday.
We have romanticized the marriage of Victoria and Albert, but in essence this was a business arrangement to further the power of the families concerned. Comments?
Most dynastic marriages were matters of state and if your birth was high enough, and you were female, you took what you were given. The male had a bit more wiggle room, but most marriages were to form alliances, etc. When Victoria first met the Saxe-Coburg brothers, Ernst and Albert, she was not very impressed. When Albert came to England, however, to look her over and be looked over, she fell passionately in love with him (ergo, the nine children fast and furiously). Those Victorians might have been prim and proper on the outside but shut those bedroom doors and it seems to have been a romp. In fact she was known to say that the children put quite a damper on things… Queen Victoria was the first monarch, and one of the first women, to use anaesthetic in childbirth, and it popularized it amongs the upper classes in Britain. The proletariat were still pushing and puffing the old fashioned way. Albert never loved her in quite the same way, but he was a straight arrow and did not fool around. Quite provincial in their thinking, those Germans! He was very proud of his shapely legs, and would use every opportunity to pose in tights for the edification of the sculptor, painter, and (presumably) Vicky.
Poor Albert died when he was 42 and Victoria wore black for the rest of her life. She still visited her cousins in Coburg, and stayed in the Schloss Ehrenberg in town and at Rosenau. The guide pointed out to me the spot on the carriageway where she would always stop for a last, longing look back at the Schloss.
I became interested in Sachsen Coburg und Gothen because my brother lives there. He married a German. I knew nothing about the region, until I visited him for the first time several years ago. One day we were on a bike ride around the beautiful Bavarian countryside, and he casually pointed to a beautiful building in the woods nearby and told me it was Rosenau, where Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, had been brought up. Suddenly my history lessons made sense. I sat on a bench that Victoria used to sit on when she came to Coburg. In fact, she always said that she wished she was not royal because she would love to have been a hausfrau living at Rosenau. She used to go there a lot and live as an ‘ordinary’ person (Hrmph!!). Personally, I do not think that would have lasted long, not when you are used to minions doing all sorts of things for you. She stayed at the Schloss Ehrenburg in the town centre when she came to visit, as well.
There is a gothic castle on the hill overlooking Coburg (called a Veste in Deutschland), and it is not the kind of regularly shaped Norman castles we are used to in England. It is referred to as The Crown of Franconia, and when you see it from below it does look like a diadem on the top of the hill. It is very beautiful.
According to the House Law of the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha the full title of the Duke was: We, Ernst, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Jülich, Cleves and Berg, also Angria and Westphalia, Landgrave in Thuringia, Margrave of Meissen, Princely Count of Henneberg, Count of the Mark and Ravensberg, Lord of Ravenstein and Tonna, et cetera. Can you give us some background on this? (I am very happy with my 3 word title!)
It is quite common for the German princes to have all kinds of lands all over Germany and each bit of land comes with a title of some sort and if not – ve maken von oop! I have just read a history of the German speaking peoples and really I am surprised that they had so much history! I thought England was the champion of that, and of course when we were at school in UK the European countries were all bundled together under the euphemism of ‘the continent’. I believe that the Almanach de Gothe was required reading in every German noble’s schoolroom every day, with tests on Friday.
We have romanticized the marriage of Victoria and Albert, but in essence this was a business arrangement to further the power of the families concerned. Comments?
Most dynastic marriages were matters of state and if your birth was high enough, and you were female, you took what you were given. The male had a bit more wiggle room, but most marriages were to form alliances, etc. When Victoria first met the Saxe-Coburg brothers, Ernst and Albert, she was not very impressed. When Albert came to England, however, to look her over and be looked over, she fell passionately in love with him (ergo, the nine children fast and furiously). Those Victorians might have been prim and proper on the outside but shut those bedroom doors and it seems to have been a romp. In fact she was known to say that the children put quite a damper on things… Queen Victoria was the first monarch, and one of the first women, to use anaesthetic in childbirth, and it popularized it amongs the upper classes in Britain. The proletariat were still pushing and puffing the old fashioned way. Albert never loved her in quite the same way, but he was a straight arrow and did not fool around. Quite provincial in their thinking, those Germans! He was very proud of his shapely legs, and would use every opportunity to pose in tights for the edification of the sculptor, painter, and (presumably) Vicky.
Poor Albert died when he was 42 and Victoria wore black for the rest of her life. She still visited her cousins in Coburg, and stayed in the Schloss Ehrenberg in town and at Rosenau. The guide pointed out to me the spot on the carriageway where she would always stop for a last, longing look back at the Schloss.
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Boy, that Sheila sounds like a hoot! I'll certainly be at the program next Tuesday night to hear her!
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