Fun fact: the last Bulgarian tsar (Simeon II) who held this title for a very short time (from his father’s death in 1943 until the communist revolution in 1944) actually became prime minister of Bulgaria and served as such from 2001-2005. I was a young kid when it happened but I remember how much people used to talk about it. It’s not every day a monarch comes back to his country some 60 years later to be elected democratically lol
@@joshuahunt3032 Simeon II was 5 years old when he took the throne and when Bulgaria became a communist state, I believe, though what is certain though is that he was below the age of 8 when the later years of WW2 were happening
Happens more often than you think lol. People love stories like that and a complacent populace loves dynastic worship. Just look at how many of American presidents share a last name: the plebians love that kind of continuity compared to just voting in 'unknowns' everytime.
The other issue is Batenberg's rule wasn't ended because he was terrible, it was ended because his relations with Alexander III were far worse than those with Alexander II. He ruled autocratically with Russian troop backing for a while until with the backing of Bulgarian politicians exiled to Southern Rumelia he did a counter coup against the Russian generals... And then we get the Bulgarian Serb war, 4 Russian backed coup attempts, the Russian Black Sea fleet trying to intimidate Varna, the Stambolov led regency and only then Ferdinand.
I feel like we've known about dinosaur fossils for millenia, attributing them to mythical beings. Would still be interesting to see our interpretation of them over the years though.
Naturlich. Was sprechen die zu hause....but British propaganda was vicious. They were yeloous that the grandson wilhelm. Also wanted some colonies..etc...now British are always great with propaganda. The germans. Are babykillers. The huns.....their language is tooo GUTERAL...etc. all in to the war of USA....we all know the story.. the germans. Starter war1. Opera winfree.....ha ha ha...i love you all...and I have to stand also for DEUTSCHLA ND Th e British always whisper into the war of USA. Remember. Special
My favorite bit of related history is that the Swedish Royal Family are not Swedish or even German but French as the throne was offered to one of Napoleons Marshals Jean Bernadotte who started off his career as a Private soldier.
In case any of you were wondering about the other European monarchs: Spain and Sweden were ruled by French dynasties, Portugal by a double-bastard line of a French dynasty (later German), Italy was ruled by a Franco-Italian dynasty, while Serbia, Montenegro, and the Ottoman Empire had their own native dynasties. Edit 1: the Netherlands was technically ruled by a German dynasty, but apparently they became Dutch enough that History Matters didn't include them here, Luxembourg was also ruled by a German, later French dynasty, Liechtenstein was German, and Monaco was Italian. Edit 2: Actually, the Monegasque dynasty was technically French in the male line, but like the imperial house of Russia, they kept their original family name, which was Grimaldi, Italian in origin. Edit 3: Albania was also ruled by a German dynasty briefly in 1914, but the prince only lived in the country for a couple of months before he fled due to a rebellion, and after a period of turmoil, they chose their own native king. Edit 4: Also of note is that after the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, Germany had plans to have Finland, Lithuania, and Livonia have their own German monarchies, while Ukraine would be ruled by its own native dynasty, but that plan didn't work out for obvious reasons. Edit 5: Actually, Portugal was also ruled by a German dynasty from 1837 to 1910, the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, the difference being that they kept the Braganza name. Edit 6: The Habsburg dynasty of the 19th century wasn't just Habsburg, it was the house of Habsburg-Lorraine, descended agnatically from the House of Lorraine, a region between Germany and France. Like the House of Savoy, I think it can be best described as Franco-German.
Great vid! Btw the first Bulgarian Prince was long-thought of being "terrible" as the video said, mainly because he was fighting for independence from Russia. The history available is usually written during the communist period and describes him as such, but recent evidence shows that he was actually very popular and not that terrbile at all.
Kinda doesn't count. When talking about if a country's royal family is German, what you're really talking about if the ruling house has a German name. In the Brazilian case, the ruling house was a Portugese branch of the house of Burgundy. So despite Pedro II having a German mother, he was of a Portugese house. If you squint Franco-Portugese.
Actually, the last emperor of Brazil wasn't German, but Austrian - There's a big difference there! Austrians are Germanic (which has nothing to do with the country Germany or being German), but not German!
@@Nightmare-fq1vv Absolutely wrong and just pure copium. Austrians are very much Germans. They're just like Fyromians; drip fed propaganga since the end ofWW2 to pretend they're their own people. In the Fyromians case, they pretend they're not Bulgarians. Austrians on the other hand pretend they're not German. Austrian "identity" literally just revolves around saying how not German they are(a sign they're not a real group). I already know you're counterargument: "aCkShUaLly, AuStRiA iS oLdEr ThAn GeRmAnY". No shit sherlock. That's because Germany was founded in 1871 on the principle of uniting the *many* German states under one country. Austria was just one them. In fact, Austria competed with Prussia as to be the one state in which the Germans rally under. So just because a country called Austria existed for a few centuries does not mean they're a nation. It's like trying to argue Hannoverians or Holsteiners are not German but their own group.
One of my favorite ones so far! All of the connections between the royal houses of Europe makes the Great War even more fascinating, as it was more or less a family feud gone wrong
Some corrections about 🇩🇰 Denmark: Christoffer III was also from a German family; he was actually born in Bavaria to the house of Wittelsbach. Furthermore, Christoffer was the third monarch of the Kalmar Union who died childless; before him was Queen Margrethe I (House of Estridsen) and King Erik VII (House of Griffin). It's correct that the Oldenburg Dynasty still rules Denmark (and Norway) today. However the main branch died out with the childless King Frederik VII in 1863. The current branch is called Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg and is only remotely related to the original branch (through Duke John (Hans) II of Schleswig, who was a younger brother of King Frederik II of Denmark). Finally, I want to point out that Denmark officially was an elective monarchy until 1665 during the reign of King Frederik III. However, in the latter years it was widely regarded as a formality as the King's oldest son was almost always elected as the new king.
Finland too wanted a German king when it got Independence in 1917. It was a sort of thank you to Germany for their assistance in The Finnish civil war. Candidates were numerous, including the Crown Prince of Germany, who the Kaiser refused as he kinda needs and heir too. So we landed with Friedrich Karl of Hessen, the Kaiser's brother in law. Corinations were set and Friedrich was packing his bags until Germany lost WW1. And the Finns boldly stated that they don't speak loser. So then they just said "F*ck it, guess we'll be a republic"
When you do a deep dive, ALL European royal houses are related to each other and married again into each other. The Spanish royals married the Portuguese, English, Austrian, French, Italian and German states, Belgian, Danish, Dutch royal houses or nobility. And because the Spanish descended German speaking Austrian based Habsburgs married into various other German speaking states royal houses, along with Polish, French, and Italian houses, they completed circles when the Germans married into the English royal house again. Marie Antoinette for example had Austrian, Spanish, Italian, Bavarian ancestry (including the Medicis as ancestors) among others. So did her husband French King Louis XVI. Henry VIII of England was already the descendant of a Spanish princess who wed an English king earlier in the 1200s, when Henry himself was married to another Spanish princes Catherine of Aragon, the daughter of Queen Isabella of Castile in the 1500s. And his relatives, who took over (and Scottish rivals) carried the same lineage, and then married into the German, Portuguese, Scandinavian, and Spanish royal houses--again. And the Austrian Habsburgs as mentioned married many times into other German speaking states whether it was Bavaria, Saxony, Württemberg, etc. who in turn married into further German speaking nobility in other German states. Then these German royals and nobility married into French houses like Burgundy or Sweden, or Bohemians (Czechia). The French in turn married with the Spanish for centuries, the English and Scots, Luxembourg, north Italian states, as well as already established German states. One big European family going round and round.
Yeah, the genetics of all European high nobility was basically a - surprisingly small - bush, going back to a small collection of families being able to grab power during Late Antiquity to at latest the HIgh Middle Ages. Fresh blood was rare (unless some woman cheated and we don't know) as marrying even low nobles was an outrage as late as the early 1900s (Franz Ferdinand's Sophie comes to mind).
except Ottomans. (Before anyone start Turkey is not Europe etc, Ottomans were major actors in European politics until the end) But Ottomans at the beginning married Roman and some Balkan princesses though. Back in 14th and 15th centuries. They stopped marrying outside later and married to slave girls because the family didn't want to share any power
@cmfrtblynmb02 After the 1400s the Ottomans sort of became a bit less relevant in western Europe until WWI. Catholicism was what united the royals in western and Central Europe. Even after the Protestant movements, Christianity as a whole was still very central to most European royal houses. Many convents for instance were sponsored by royalty. Let's not mention the Crusades. The Ottoman empire was Muslim and there was no chance of arranged marriages between the Christian west and Muslim east who were often seen as enemies of the faith. The Age of Exploration also created new world empires led by the Spanish, English, Portuguese, Dutch, and French. And after that, the Enlightenment, Industrial Revolution, and reunification movements propped up the Austrians, Germans, Italians, and Britain and France again to global powers. It was mainly among those countries where the royals mixed and matched. Poland, Russia, and Scandinavia being on the periphery but still geographically close also had some royal marriage spillover since they were also Christian countries. Southeast Europe on the other hand, even Greece, let alone the Ottomans, had were sort of blocked off by the Austro-Hungarian empire and the fact that the Ottomans were of an entirely different religion which during the Middle Ages and even into modernity are central to European royals (many countries for instance didn't allow marriage outside Catholicism for royals; still true for British royals regards Anglicans).
@@danmur2797 I see your points but some I don't agree. if religion was real hurdle, ottoman sultans would not be able to marry some Serbian and byzantine princesses. I think until Mehmed II, Ottoman sultans had those kinds of marriages It is more the case of house of Othman decided not to get married outside. There were literally hundreds of princesses that were waiting to be married and one of them would be sent to house of Othman, I am pretty sure. Besides a Christian woman don't have to convert to get married to a Muslim men. A lot of royalty in Europe would like an ally like Ottomans who were still a major power until like 1800. But house of Othman decided to close their family to outside after the instability happened after death of Bayezid I. They even stopped marrying to Turkish or other Muslim houses. They decided to create the institution of harem which was opened up to slave girls (so that these girls had no family or no ties) So it is not only that they shunned other royals as marriage prospects. They wanted women who had no relatives at all. This is clearly a decision that comes from their side Otherwise I honestly don't believe if an Ottoman sultan told they wanted to some German house to be tied to. There were hundreds of royal houses in the holy Roman empire, one would be more than happy to send one daughter.dont tell me there is not one king or prince didn't want Süleyman I as his son in law. The guy basically ruled the biggest land army and the biggest armada in Mediterranean sea. It was USA of his day.
@cmfrtblynmb02 I don't think you understand. The royals of Europe answered to the pope in Rome. They supported the pope. They died for Christianity/Catholic beliefs. They even went to war over Protestantism when some began to break with the Catholic Church. They wanted to consolidate power within a Christian kingdom. Marrying off a daughter or son to a Muslim kingdom offered them no benefit. And especially if they were one among many wives at the same time which, although not unheard off, a harem was not the norm. Aside from that geography also played a part. The seat of the Ottoman Empire was far
Small correction regarding 🇬🇷 Otto of Bavaria (or Otto of Greece) was chosen by the Great Powers after the assassination of our first president Ioannis Kapodistrias. He turned out to be quite unpopular with his Greek subjects, and also seemed like he couldn't have children, so he was deposed in 1862 ( the latter of which probably played a bigger role). To replace him the Greeks at first wanted to nominate the future king of the UK, Prince Alfred but his nomination was refused by the Great Powers. So they went to their 2nd choice, Prince William of Denmark of the house of Glücksburg, who as mentioned in the video, were also German.
Prince Alfred was the second son of Victoria and Albert. Their first son was crown prince Albert, known better as King Edward VII. He would play a role however because he was married to William/George's sister in the same year he became king of Greece which thus created a close connection to the United Kingdom anyway as the crown princess/queen of the UK would be the sister of the king of Greece
I once read an article how Otto was arriving in Greece. He had a classical educated entourage that knew ancient Greek and seriously attempted to rule the country as if it was some ancient country. One observer commented that ruling Greece like this is like ruling a German kingdom with the language of Walter von der Vogelweide. Also they commented that the country was extremely destroyed after the war of independence. "this is how Germany must have looked like after the thirty years war." Since reading that I am in love with the idea of visiting Rome and attempting to do all my orders in Latin.
@@Nicolas25165 What? Do you mean Pedro II.? His mother was from the House of Habsburg, the daughter of the Austrian Emperor. But his house is still that of Braganza because of his father. Idk where you got Saxe-coburg and gotha from
Alright, here we go: UK - House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha Belgium - Same as above Bulgaria - Same as above Denmark - House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (Branch of the House of Oldenburg) Norway - Same as above Greece - Same as above Russia - House of Holstein-Gottorp-Romanov Albania - House of Wied-Neuwied Austria - House of Habsburg-Lorraine Romania - House of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen Germany - 21 states and dynasties, some of whose monarchs were agnatic relatives, just ruled by different branches of their families Kingdoms: Prussia - House of Hohenzollern Bavaria - House of Wittelsbach Württemberg - House of Württemberg Saxony - House of Wettin (most junior Wettin line) Grand Duchies: Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach - House of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach (2nd of the Ernestine Houses) Oldenburg - House of Oldenburg (offshoot of the House of Holstein-Gottorp, most junior branch of the entire Oldenburg dynasty) Baden - House of Zähringen Hesse - House of Hesse-Darmstadt Mecklenburg-Schwerin - House of Mecklenburg Schwerin (senior line of the House of Mecklenburg) Mecklenburg-Strelitz - House of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (junior line of the House to Mecklenburg) Duchies: Brunswick - House of Hanover Anhalt - House of Ascania Saxe-Altenburg - House of Saxe-Altenburg (most senior branch of the entire Wettin dynasty, 1st of the Ernestine houses) Saxe-Meiningen - House of Saxe-Meiningen (3rd of the Ernestine houses) Saxe-Coburg and Gotha - House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (4th of the Ernestine houses) Principalities: Lippe(-Detmold) - House of Lippe (Lippe-Biesterfeld line) Schaumburg-Lippe - House of Schaumburg-Lippe Reuss-Gera - House of Reuss-Gera (junior line of the Reuss family) Reuss-Greiz - House of Reuss-Greiz (senior line of the Reuss family) Waldeck and Pyrmont - House of Waldeck and Pyrmont Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt and Schwarzburg-Sondershausen - House of Schwarzburg (Sondershausen line extinct with the death of Charles Gonthier, Prince of Schwarzburg-Sondershausen in 1909, states not merged due to political opposition from their constituent state assemblies)
And then Prince Philip of Greece (House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg) through his marriage to Elizabeth Windsor (Saxe-Coburg and Gotha) made the UK monarchy even MORE German.
@@GrouRocks To be more specific, Duke Henry of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld, and Prince Claus von Amsberg were all German princes/nobles who married Queens Wilhelmina, Juliana, and Beatrix respectively. In the case of the latter, his marriage was met with protests due to lingering anti-German sentiment from WWII and the fact that von Amsberg had been a member of the Hitler Youth.
@@angusyang5917 Correction: Claus was a soldier in the Wehrmacht in 1944-1945. The details of his time as a 'Totenkopf' were carefully erased from the historic record by the powers that be.
The one thing I like about this channel more than any others, it can get everything into 5 minutes that take other channels 20 minutes to a half hour or more
After viewing this episode, it now makes perfect sense why French Emperor Napoleon III sent the Austrian Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian Joseph of the House of Habsburg to be Emperor of Mexico in 1863. Thanks History Matters!
It was actually under his recommendation that the Hohenzollerns got the Romanian throne. The Romanian elite of the time was hugely Francophile so they requested the Emperor pick a candidate
Always love these! I can't tell if it's just me or not but I've really been enjoying how it seems the output of new videos has been more frequent recently!
On the subject of Germany, one thing History Matters could explore in the near future is why there are so many descendants of ethnic Germans in the United States today (they are literally in the top two ethnic groups last I checked). A number were in Pennsylvania among other areas even before the American Revolution, and then an explosion of immigration from German lands happened in the 1800s. I myself am largely of German descent, though it's mixed with Scottish/British and French. It would be fascinating to hear more about.
To elaborate, topography played a large role. Germany, being basically a mountainous country, made it difficult for lords and other royals to overtake one another. German states, separated by mountains and rivers, were able to remain independent and defend themselves against each other. This made it possible for royals in small fiefdoms, to maintain their positions. Some castles were mere yards from each other. This is also why the German language has so many dialects and accents. Peoples were separated and their languages evolved differently.
Half of Germany is plains. You can literally tell the "border" between the mountain/hill part and the plains part not only from how the people speak, but kinda from the type of sausage (no 100% overlap).
Weird to exclude the Dutch royal family. The first line of their national anthem mentions that William of Orange is of German blood... They continually married with Prussians and other German houses, kept ruling Nassau (in Germany...) even when they got kicked out of the Netherlands. They were reinstated by the Vienna Congress and thus slightly before the Greek got their independence.
He also excluded Albania as well, although that's more understandable since their German monarchy didn't last more than half a year. He also forgot Portugal, who ruled by the same royal house as Britain, Belgium, and Bulgaria.
The mention of German(Duits) has little to do with germany itself. The word used is Duytschen wich comes from Diets meaning poeple or of the poeple. The Nassua part is true tough.
When the dutch national athem was written there was no such as germany or being german, at the time “duits” was just an ambrulla term meaning germanic people groups. That is also the reason why people from the Netherlands are called dutch in english
I was actually quite surprised that Queen Victoria didn't get brought up. I know she loved marrying off her family so was curious if this was going to be a factor or not.
She's how the Hanoverian dynasty became the Saxe-Coburg Gotha/Windsor one; granddaughter of George III, therefore descended from the German George I, she married Albert, a German Prince.
@@silenthunteruk This is the first I've ever heard of that. May I ask where you got that information from? Because even though Victoria was technically a member of the German house of Hannover, that house had ruled and lived in the UK for over a century by the time she was born and was pretty much britizised - so much that Victorias uncle Ernest Augustus who ruled in Germany as King of Hannover still regarded himself as Englishman years after he had left England and taken the throne of Hannover. The members of the royal house of Hannover in that time spoke English as a mothertongue so it seems odd that any of them would've had a German accent - especially as Victoria had no ties to Germany and as far as I know never even visited German lands during her childhood (I believe Hannover she never visited ar all).
@@shimanopetermann9068 It came up during the airing of 'Victoria', but seems to be debatable. Never really proven either way - no audio confirmed to be of her exists.
Mendelssohn said that the Queen spoke good German, which would indicate that she spoke it as a foreign language, presumably with an English accent, rather than that German was prevelant and meant she spoke English with a German accent-I am not aware that anyone has suggested George III, George IV or William IV spoke English with a German accent, so why should Victoria?
Here in Spain the monarch has also a great ammount of german ancestry, back to the Hapsbusrgs and from more recent times, being son of a greek princess from the german house of Glücksburg
A striking omission of royal families of German extraction is the Orange-Nassau dynasty of the Netherlands. 6 out of 8 great-grandparents of Queen Wilhelmina, who reigned in 1914, were born in Germany to German noble families, a seventh (Paul I of Russia) was from a family that you do label as German, and of the eighth, William I of the Netherlands, all eight great-grandparents were born in Germany. If that family is not German, I cannot think what family is. (Side note: when a couple of years ago Willem-Alexander, the current king, spoke German at a televised event, Dutch commentators commended him for his impeccable German. I found that amazing, given that his father was German, as was his grandfather on his mother's side. In fact, Wilhelmina is the only one of his great-grandparents not born in Germany.)
Historically there was no distinction between Dutch and German on the previous centuries. The connection becomes even clearer when you compare Dutch to Liw German. Both Germans and Dutch are a fusion of various Germanic tribes i.a. Franks, Saxons, Frisians etc.
@@marchauchler1622 You are not wrong, of course. The Dutch Royal family only became royal, however, in 1815, by which time a significant difference between what are now Germany and the Netherlands was present. Barring the dialect continuum along the border of the two countries there was little mutual intelligibility between the languages, and there was a history of centuries of political separation (at least since 1648 the Netherlands were not part of the Holy Roman Empire).
@@marchauchler1622 there definitely began to develop a distinction from the 17th century onwards, in Wilhelmina's time there was already a clear difference about as much (if not more) than today. (Speaking about how they are viewed, not linguistically inherently, then we can go back earlier.)
However, the most prominent name of the Dutch royal family, i.e. 'of orange', which was not adopted to suit the sensibilities of the population like the UK or Russia (it really was only translated) is French. So it can be argued that the family is French, even if the second, lesser known part of the family name is German.
3:29 I always appreciate how much research he does. Very few know that "Stroopwafels are delicious" was one of the mottos of the Dutch speaking peoples
The Dutch speaking peoples? I’ve lived in Belgium for whole my life, but never have I seen anyone eating a “stroopwafel”, while in the Netherlands that’s one of the main snacks I see. Belgium is more famous for its normal waffles (Brussels and Liégeois, the two types are even named after Belgian city’s)
One small correction: prince Carol of House of Hohenzollern (later known as king Carol the First) became prince of Romania in 1866 after Alexandru Ioan Cuza (the Romanian ruler mentioned in the video) was overthrown by a coalition of radical liberals and conservatives. At that time, Romania was still under Ottoman domination. We gained independence in 1879 after allying ourselves with Russia in a war against the Ottoman Empire.
Charles I radiated Gigachad-raw-manliness energy. If this man entered this room right now and tells me that he is the king now, my answer would be: "as you wish, your majesty." Look him up and tell me that you would react differently
I once read an article how Otto was arriving in Greece. He had a classical educated entourage that knew ancient Greek and seriously attempted to rule the country as if it was some ancient country. One observer commented that ruling Greece like this is like ruling a German kingdom with the language of Walter von der Vogelweide. Also they commented that the country was extremely destroyed after the war independence. "this is how Germany must have looked like after the thirty years war." Since reading that I am in love with the idea of visiting Rome and attempting to do all my orders in Latin.
That is both very intelligent and witty! Besides: The Bavarian house of Wittelsbach unfortunately produced some very romantic princes who were just not made for a real kingdom with its heavy crowns…
from a German perspective marrying into these houses was very attractive for several reasons: the options of increasing your rank within the holy roman empire were limited. Since the holy roman empire already had a king there was no way to become a king of a state that was a part of the empire (apart form the king of bohemia, who was also a Habsburg). A kingdom within a kingdom makes no sense and a country that already has a king can't have a second one. So the only way to legally become a king is by marrying into a family from another country Increasing one's rank was important for reasons of prestige but also had real world implications. I.e. a lower ranking noble had harder access to even get an audience with a higher ranking one. In case they got one then the entire procedure left no doubt that they were less important: like they have to sit on a simpler, less comfortable chair, while the higher ranking one had the best seat. Also the sitting order was different, often you wouldn't even be invited to important meatings etc. etc. etc. The chances of even being heard by the more powerful people therefore diminished, which means that these monarchs simply had not an equal say when important decisions were made. It really changed the real power these monarchs had. it is no surprise therefore that people were really obsessed with prestigious titles, ranks, orders etc. Their whole world and their social status depended on these things. Btw. the fact that German families couldn't become kings/czars/emperors etc. also motivated them to become kings of something else. in 1697 the electorate prince of saxony became also king of Poland and established a personal union which lasted for 66 years between the two countries. In1701 the electorate prince of Brandenburg became king in Prussia ( later of Prussia). And as already mentioned in the video in 1714 the electorate prince of Hannover became king of Great Britain. This way these monarchs could increase their ranks and also become more powerful players in Germany and Europe despite the fact that their native countries weren't that important. P.S.: plenty of kings from other kings also ruled some territories within the holy Roman empire without their core regions being a part of it. That would be Sweden and Denmark, later Britain. On the side of the countries they married into: The German monarchs were actually quite good, because they tachnically were rulers of some independent place which was seen as a good thing, since marrying an actual ruler was seen as better than someone who only rules in name or doesn't even rule a place at all. Many of the German families were not particularly wealthy, maybe on par with English gentry, and were therefor no threat to anyone's power. Sometimes they were accepted because that means that they are easier to control and also more likely to actually rule in the interest of their new country since it is much more important than their home country. If you had married a french, spanish or russian member of the royal family than they might have acted only in the interest of their old coutnry and your country ends up being a colony of a greater power. Also an unimportant German family is probably more willing to assimilate to the rules of the new country since they are happy to finally actually rule some place. Furthermore German dynasties had different religions, like protestantism, catholicism and reformed. You could always find someone of your religion to marry or who was willing to convert, which was always the case if the country was orthodox. PS: btw. I have a huge man-crush on the first Hohenzollern king of Romania: Charles I . He radiated Gigachad-raw-manliness energy. If this man entered this room right now and tells me that he is the king now my answer would be: "as you wish, your majesty." Look him up and tell me that you would react differently
You guys are truly wonderful and deserve a reward for making such amusing, informative, memorable yet succinct clips. Kudos! Wish you well and hope schools and other learning institutions workdwide discover you. And of course curious young minds whose horizons you will surely broaden😊
@Geralt of Pimpland "Paterson is a 2016 drama film written and directed by Jim Jarmusch. The film stars Adam Driver as a bus driver and poet named Paterson, and Golshifteh Farahani as his wife, who dreams of being a country music star and opening a cupcake business. "
Because the Finnish really didn't like Russia and Finland would have been the absolute worst place to have rebellions in. Autonomy was the easiest way to keep the Finns satisfied
@@mav8535 Ironically, it was the lack of Finnish rebellions that kept it autonomous for so long. Russia had control over Finland, and they weren't rebelling, so unlike Poland, they adopted a "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" attitude, at least until the 1890s.
I will never understand why Europeans (and some other nations) were so inclined to install a monarch or ruler of “royal breed”, even a foreign one, before a local. That’s like the dumbest thing I can think of.
so, i need to complain about it somewhere. the belgians pocked their king in a great big congress after disagreeing a lot. so did the greeks btw as leopold 1 previously refused the greek throne and then we snatched him up and as explained by a shitton of people the netherlands also have a german monarchy
@@davidcervantes9336 Because it's important to install one of 'your own' to safeguard the monarchies' interests, and also because of habit. Installing a local only serves to bring the country further away from europe's 'collective' interests.
@@davidcervantes9336 you wrote this under other comments too. Is there a little provocation going on? Or a little jealousy? And NO, having a good King ruling over a nation is not dumb - it is the smartest thing you can have, actually.
Here in Ireland, several leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising (for which the Germans attempted to send a shipment of weapons which were intercepted by the British) considered the idea of crowning Kaiser Wilhelm II's youngest son Joachim the King of Ireland, despite of being members of the Irish REPUBLICAN Brotherhood.
I will never understand why Europeans (and some other nations) were so inclined to install a monarch or ruler of “royal breed”, even a foreign one, before a local. That’s like the dumbest thing I can think of.
@@mojewjewjew4420 16th century and early 17th century. They Russia started looking to the east and found forest full of furry little creatures which were pritty much money printing machines. British quickly noticed and established their trade with Ivan the Terrible and Godunov loved those damn coins. But British tried few times to eatablish network of posts in unclaimed land, but failed. British were then like "I didn't want your stupid furrs and woods anyway" salty and started looking west toward Amerca. France had same as Britain without pesky Russians and those Spanish and Portugese colonies looked dope as hell. Rest is as they say is history. Fun fact: trade with Russia was training ground for future British East India Company.
Here's two fun facts HM ommitted here: 1: 3:26 Yes, as the attentive among you might have noticed, Leopold I was of the same royal family as that which would eventually come to the throne and still reigns in the UK. Similarly to how the house of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha switched their name to the house of Windsor, the belgian house switched its name to the much less original "House of Belgium" at the same time and for the same reasons. To this day, the royals of both the UK and Belgium technically belong to this same royal house. 2: 3:14 The first-choice monarch for Greece was actually Leopold I, who would soon go on to take the throne of Belgium instead. HM clearly was aware of this since he used the same character model in both animations, dunno why he didn't say it haha ^^ consider this an easter egg
The Bulgarian royal family is also from Saxe-Coburg Gotha. Our last Tsar, Simeon II (who was even PM from '01-'05) is a distant cousin of Elizabeth II.
Leopold was actually married to Charlotte, the only child of George IV, and was set to become Prince Consort. But she died in childbirth and, well, there went those plans. He did, however, recommend his sister to his deceased wife's uncle Edward, Duke of Kent, who became the parents of Queen Victoria. He then played a role later in getting his nephew Albert and Queen Victoria together....
Saxe-Coburg-Gotha no longer reign in UK. That dynasty literally ended with Elizabeth II. Charles, while her son, is actually agnatically of his father's dynasty - the Glucksburg dynasty which is a cadet of Danish Oldenburg dynasty. This same dynasty ruled also (besides Denmark and Norway) in Russia and Greece. The fact Charles kept officially the name Windsor is besides the point.
As I understand it, a lot of the 'marrying off' to other royal houses happened because many dynastic laws said people in line for the throne (of wherever) had to marry houses of equal status. There were so many German states with houses of equal status to other monarchies. If someone in line didn't marry properly, it was considered a morganatic marriage and basically dropped all descendants of the line from any succession rights
Easy to do when lots of illnesses that you can survive but end up causing medical issues later like low sperm count. Then you have the very high maternal and infant mortality rates. Both were 10% in the UK and US in 1900 god knows how bad both were in the 18th century or earlier.
It is so funny that when the queen had her 70th anniversary this year we had a monarchy expert in German national television who constantly reminded us how proud we Germans could be as well because the queen is technically a German queen too making it "our queen" haha
Stupid journalists for stupid people. Every educated german knows about the british royals being of german blood. On the other hand recent powers take an immense effort in teaching people to disrespect our own nobility. But times may change..
This was like the cliff notes presented through a fire hose and animated for simplicity....awkwardly satisfying, bravo to the production team and narrator, 🤛🏻👊🏻🤜🏻 For sure this same team should produce a slightly slower paced yet more in depth series....💪🏼🧠✊🏼✌️
CORRECTION 2:00: The house of Oldenburg does actually no longer reign in Denmark today. Christian VII. (who was the last absolute monarch) died childless, so prince Christian Frederik from the house of Glücksburg was picked as the new king (Christian IX.) and it is the house of Glücksburg, who still reigns to this day in Denmark. (I'm not keen on Norwegian history, so I don't know about them).
the House of Glucksburg is part of the House of Oldenburg. The present Norwegian monarchy started around 1905 with the first king being a Danish Prince
The house of Oldenburg is also where the Romanovs and the old Greek royal family came from. (Bavarian royal only stuck a few years and they plucked a Danish one after)
After all of the "and they died childless", I see now that the short version of why there are so many German monarchs is that they are really really good at having kids. Because, you know, German is the language of romance.
according to Mark twain it actually is the language of love and affection and it is impossible to be angry in German since the language lacks impulsive agressive words. he had the opinion that German language should import English words so it is finally possible to be angry in that language.
"I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse." - Charles V. Something I'll always remember from the medieval II total war loading screens
Ah no. Most of those that died childless did so because any children they did have died, often at birth. It seems weird but during this period, pandemics apart, the rich often lost more children than the average people. This was because, in those days, doctors were more dangerous to your health than *not* having doctors.
Cuza, the "despotic" Romanian leader, was so "despotic" that the guys who made him leave are now known in Romanian history as "The monstrous coalition"
Regarding Queen Anne's cousin, Sophia was James 1's granddaughter and she was married to a German noble. She was Anne's heir, but she died before Anne did.
I love the idea that some long lasting ruling dynasties in European countries came to be because "another nation chose our King back in the day and his descendants still rule"
I will never understand why Europeans (and some other nations) were so inclined to install a monarch or ruler of “royal breed”, even a foreign one, before a local. That’s like the dumbest thing I can think of.
@@davidcervantes9336 there are several reasons. Mainly because when you're choosing a local house over a foreign one,it creates a sort of resentment by the other houses coz it could've been them instead of them. A foreigner to rule over you would create less of that. And since it's a foreigner they won't know much about the land and it's customs. So you could take advantage of that to secure more power and privileges for yourself. Also a foreign dynasty helps because it's most prolly a junior son of the ruling family of a foreign country. So obviously they'll have some intrests in keeping up the house in the new country which in turn would make sure they won't be eaten up by another country.
@@davidcervantes9336 One of the biggest reasons for choosing a foreigner is compromise. Sure, during the American War of Independence George Washington quickly established himself as the talented, accomplished and universally admired leader of the revolution, but most newly-independent countries didn't have a George Washington, but rather many different leaders, each representing different factions of society and many of them rivals, all with different visions of what the country should be. In that kind of climate, a foreign noble will make for a much more universally popular monarch than any given local leader. This was especially the case in countries with major cultural divides, for example in Belgium, a country split between a Dutch-speaking North and French-Speaking south, putting a German bloke on the throne was a pretty good compromise. The other major reason, as mentioned in the video, was diplomatic. Going back to Belgium, Leopold I was married to the British King's niece, and following her death his second marriage was to the King of France's daughter. These connections ensured good relations between the young nation and the Great Powers whose support it desperately needed, and guaranteed protection from any attempt at reconquest by the Dutch, as Britain and France now had a piece of their 'dynastic honour' invested in Belgian independence - some random Belgian dude wouldn't've had those valuable connections. TL;DR: Both in terms of internal stability and external diplomacy, making a foreign royal your monarch was a very shrewd decision for many newly-independent countries in 19th century Europe.
@@spaghettification8658 Interesting, as a Yank I've had a hard time figuring out the reasons of monarchies, you and the comment above you explained it pretty clear and I have a better understanding now, once again the comment section on this channel is as good as the video. I do find Cromwell an interesting figure in history, had he lived longer or if his son would of been stronger would there of been a house of Cromwell? I always found it strange they brought back King Charles son but I can see it was for the stability.
The House of Saxe Coburg and Gotha has now been succeeded by a junior branch of the House of Oldenburg, namely the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg / Mountbatton-Windsor
fun fact: Simeon Borisov von Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the czar of Bulgaria, is the only man in history who was czar of a country and also a democratically elected prime minister of it 45 years later. He is still alive btw.
Basically he used to be both the head of state and the head of government in a country where both positions are held by separate people? (IDK, my country has both positions held by the same person)
@@riziq30 he wasn't both at the same time. He was czar during the second world war, when he was a child. Therefor he didnt make any decisions More then 50 years after that he became the prime minister by a democratic election. Kind of crazy to think that a real monarch becomes prime minister so much later.
Norodom Sihanouk was also King (on two separate occasions, 1941-1955 & 1993-2012) of Cambodia, as well as Prime Minister of Cambodia from 1955-1960, after he abdicated in favour of his father (Cambodia is a semi-elective monarchy) in order to enter politics and get elected Prime Minister. He was also simply 'Head of State' of Cambodia without the title of King from 1960-1970), 'Chairman of the Presidium' (figurehead head of state) of the Communist Democratic Kampuchea regime in Cambodia from 1975-1976, President of a government in exile of Democratic Kampuchea from 1979-1989 (which had international recognition, including retaining Cambodia's seat at the UN), and head of a provisional government from 1989 to 1993.
1. Es war das Haus Oldenburg, besonders mit ihrer Seitenlinie Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg 2. Lediglich die Dänen, das Hause Oldenburg selber und die Norweger vertreten diese Linie. Bei Griechenland ist es nur teilweise vertreten. Man könnte natürlich noch Holstein-Bottrop dazu zählen und hätte damit auch die Russland dazu Die restlichen Monarchen stammten aber aus den Häusern Hohenzollern(-Sigmaringen) (wie Rumänien und Bulgarien) ab, Sachsen-Coburg-Gotha (Großbritannien, Belgien, (teilweise Griechenland und Russland)) und die Häuser Braunschweig, Hannover und Bayern ab.
I asked this same question in my history class to professor and he replied me back like this: "Small german states were not powerful as other great powers in that time in europe therefore selecting one of german prince was not harmful at all to the interior policies." same as in the video. Also US didn't choose a king because all of the people in the administration were basically bourgeoise. And for them, the idea of a king was not popular + if someone would be a king it must be chosen from one of them which can quickly end up as civil war.
Albania was only very briefly ruled by a German. After gaining independence in late 1912, the Congress of Trieste appointed Wilhelm of Wied, but his rule was interrupted after Albania was occupied in WW1. Albania had many regencies before being declared a republic in 1924. Then in 1928, President Ahmed Bey Zogu declared himself King Zog I. Zog was the last recognized monarch of Albania with Victor Emmanuel of Italy claiming the throne of Albania after making them a protectorate in 1939.
another brilliant and interesting clip - my only request is that the channel keep going with the English history video's thru the George 11 and onwards period. I consider your apolitical and objective presentation gives people the opportunity to learn new material and make our own decisions on what it all means. Once again - great work.
As a Belgian, I love how you translated “L’union fait la force” as “Stroopwafels zijn heerlijk” in the background 😂. Nice touch - should be our real national motto!
But it doesn't really work because stroopwafels are very much a Dutch and not a Belgian thing, even though Dutch is one of the offical languages in Belgium.
@@uytteb indeed. Stroopwafels are the kind of thing I would bring back to relatives in Belgium if I’ve been to the Netherlands. That, and some old cheese.
@Morer R The official Belgian motto means "unity makes us powerful" or "eendracht maakt macht" in Dutch. Stroopwafels are indeed very Dutch, should have chosen something more Belgian, like chocolate, beer or small firearms.
The part about Greece is flawed to say the least. The current royal lineage (which is royal in name only) is not descended from Otto of Bavaria. King George I became king seeing as the Great Powers didn't want Prince Albert of England to be named king. George I was a danish prince, and reigned from 1863 to 1913. He was assassinated and his son, Constantin I, took the throne. After "quite a messy time" of revolution in Greece, the monarchy was finally abolished in 1973. Constantine II styles himself "King of Greece" and his wife Queen Anne-Marie (sister of currently Danish Queen Margrethe II) Otto of Bavaria ruled Greece for 30 years but was overthrown and a new family was installed instead.
The Netherlands was/is also "ruled" by a German royal family. The Orange-Nassau family has German roots and (apart from William II) predominantly married German. It was the Nassau-Weilburg family (German princes and cousins of the Orange-Nassaus) that inherited the duchy of Luxembourg after Wilhelmina succeeded her father William III (Salic law) which showcases the remaining German ties. Also both Denmark en Norway are ruled by the house of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg- Glücksburg. As will the UK be! Prince Philip took the name Mountbatten similarly to what the Windsor's did, but is actually a Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg. When Charles succeeds he could still take his father's name. Finally, stroopwafels are Dutch, not Belgian ;)
Actually, the British royal house has already decided that even if Charles ascends to the throne, he'll still keep the name Windsor. To quote Prince Philip: "I am nothing but a bloody amoeba. I am the only man in the country not allowed to give his name to his own children."
@@angusyang5917 That's interesting! I thought that, as monarch, he reserved the right to change his name (regnal and last, for that matter) once he ascends to the throne, but it could well be that it has already been decided.
Dutch ~= Deutsch. The Dutch are descendants of Roman-era germanic tribes (Batavia) who never got the memo to join up and become part of the German Nation. So anyway, the idea that their monarchy comes from Germany seems natural. They're basically in denial about being the same people. The Dutch are basically just water-Germans. ⛵ Like Kevin Reynolds from Waterworld (1995).
@@matthewexline6589 I'm not too sure I agree with that. The Dutch now are predominantly descendents of the Frisian and Salic Frank peoples, as the Batavians moved south during the migration period after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. According to that reasoning the French and English would also be "Germans" as they are descendents from the Franks and Anglo-Saxon tribes, which I don't think is true. I think the political division between Germany and the Netherlands happened during the Dutch Revolt and the Peace of Münster (1648) when the Emperor recognised Dutch sovereignty and allowed them to leave the HRE. Strong ties remained, though, as many German workers migrated to the Netherlands and the Princes of Orange and Kings of the Netherlands predominantly married German.
The Bulgarian ruler mentioned here as 'a nephew of the Russian tzar' was Alexander of Battenberg, also of German stock. And he wasn't deposed because he was 'terrible' but because he opposed Russian influence in Bulgaria and was at odds with his cousin, the new Russian tzar (Alexander of Battenberg was deposed by a group of officers who were promised ranks in the Russian army with increased salary, returned to Bulgaria and then resigned due to pressure by the Great Powers - including Russia, Germany and Austria). Admittedly, he also had autocratic tendencies but remains fondly remembered by Bulgarian people for his role in the Unification of Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia, his love for his adopted homeland and his express wish to be buried in the country. In popular history he remains a universally celebrated figure, while historians have a more balanced opinion of him.
There is quite a big mistake in the bulgarian part of the video. Our first King wasn't actually a king but a Knyaz(title similar to king) and he was overthrown by a russian coup in the country. After the coup was defeated, he actually refused to come back, because it would anger the Russian empire and possibly endanger Bulgaria. He was actually a great ruler and cared deeply for Bulgaria is buried here. The following ruler Ferdinand of Austria wasn't our first choice and was actually the first one to agree to become Knyaz of Bulgaria, there were several other candidates that refused to become rulers.
The origins of the family aren’t clear. There is no clear source for the origin of the founder Humbert of Savoy. The dinasty was quite small and insignificant for it’s first few hundreds years as counts, thus little sources exist for their early history. Thus we do not what family the Savoy’s originated from (or weathed Humbert was a noble at all, though there is a legend that he was related to Emperor Otto I, which almost certainly false). Generally the “nationality” of houses are determined in two ways: Either by it’s place of birth. In this case this can be seen as either Italy (since Savoy was Italy at the time), Switzerland (since Humbert was also count of Valais) or France (since that is were Savoy is today). Otherwise it can also be given based on whom granted the title: in this case it was granted by a Burgandy, does it may be seen as a house of Burgandy (thus French).
Amazing video! The amount of information that you packed in such a small video is truly something amazing... After finishing the video I thought I was watching it for at least ten mins!
Also the weird situation where several of WWI's leaders (including ones on opposite sides) all had ties to Queen Victoria, so a bunch of cousins who were friends fought each other's countries.
3:08 Major mistake/gap here. You mentioned only the first Royal House of Wittelsbach that held the Hellenic Crown in the beginning, until the same house that you mentioned in Denmark had one of its Princes, William of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, ascend to the Hellenic Throne as George I, hence keeping the "German" albeit Danish Royal family in there. You could have mentioned his son Constantine I marrying the sister of the Kaiser and his grandson Paul marrying Frederica of Hanover, tying it more to more dynasties than that.
When most people think of German dynasties, they almost exclusively think of the male-line descent, they don't care about all of the various nuances of political marriages.
I'm currently researching the history of our local prince. It was the home of the Nassau-Oraniner in Siegen, Dillenburg and Wiesbaden. Prince Wilhelm of Nassau-Orange, born in Dillenburg, rallied soldiers and united with the Dutch against the Habsburg-Spanish. He later went down in Dutch history as William 1st King of Orange. His son exchanged Nassau-Siegen for the Duchy of Luxembourg on the occasion of the Vienna Congress in 1815. That was after Napoleon's last defeat. The princes of Luxembourg-Nassau rule to this day. Siegen was annexed to Prussian Westphalia, which is why it now belongs to North Rhine-Westphalia. But the other areas (Nassau-) Dillenburg to Wiesbaden were added to Hessen. Orange (Oranier, Oranje) was originally a French title of nobility, where the family had also taken over land. That's why the Dutch always wear orange at football matches.
You are confusing William the Silent (Dillenburg 1533) with William I of the Netherlands (The Hague 1772), and that gap between becoming the Duch Head honcho and becoming the king explains the non-inclusion in this, it was a Prince (French title) who became the head of a Republic, and that family at the head of a republic became king, but much, much later.
I found it quite interesting that the British _and_ Russian royal families both had some Germanic roots, but I found this quite an informative look into much smaller dynasties, like Denmark, Romania, and Bulgaria! In short, it's mostly about marriages, and partially about Romania and Bulgaria getting an ally from Germany! Thanks for the video! Edit: replaced "German" with "Germanic" to distinguish the country "Germany" from Germanic ethnic groups.
But they don't, this is a fundamental misunderstanding of how Royalty works. In the case of the British the current Royal Family are still descendants of Alfred the Great, so was William the Conqueror and literally every other person who wasn't born in England who ruled it after him with the ONE exception of Cromwell who was never King but a Republican Dictator. Royal Families exist outside the concept of a race of ethnicity, all of them are related to each other etc. etc. If you apply a modern lens of race and nationality to it you miss literally everything because these systems predate our entire modern concept of Nationality, Ethnicity, and Race.
They don't have "German roots" but Germanic roots, there's a big difference here! Being German has to do with being from Germany, being Germanic however has nothing to do with being from Germany or being German, but rather with speaking the language german and being from a german speaking region.
@@jorgejustin461 Good points! This would explain all the complications of royal families, which, as you said, exist outside of nationality and ethnicity! For example, most people would consider the House of Windsor to be a _British_ royal family, even with the occasional foreign blood inside of it! The important thing isn't being ethnically "British" (since Great Britain had kings long before nationality, ethnicity, or race became the concepts they are today), but merely _ruling_ Great Britain. Thanks for the correction!
@@Nightmare-fq1vv Good point! Whereas "German" usually refers to the country of Germany (which didn't even exist as a unified entity when some of these dynasties, like the British royal family or the Russian imperial one, got their Germanic roots), _GermanIC_ refers to the ethnicity: places beyond the borders of Germany, like Austria, Liechtenstein, and the German-speaking parts of Switzerland. Thanks for the correction! I updated my original comment!
For those who do not know, Windor may still be the name of the Royal house of the UK, but Charles III is a direct male line descendent of the house of Oldenberg, just as the Rusian Tsars were from Peter III onward.
The Romanian Hohenzollerns were from Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen (a Catholic branch of the House of Hohenzollern), while the Prussian branch was Protestant
Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, being part of the Ernestine line of House Wettin, might be the most successful exporter of Royalty in the 19th century. For about 1000 years being some regional margraves and dukes, with their height in power during the Lutheran Reformation, the Ernestine line lost the Archdukedom to the other Wettin line, the Albertians, and later split in smaller, and smaller dukedoms. But with the surge of the National state in the 19th century after the Napoleonic Wars, many newly formed states noted a grave lack of homegrown royalty. Being oppressed for centuries does not bode well for your own lineages of princes and kings, and thus, they had to look elsewhere.
To be fair to Anne it's not like she didn't try, she was pregnant 17 times, 14 were miscarriages/stillbirths, two didn't make it past a year and the last one died at age 11
She surely was the Most tragic English Queen who suffered the most both as woman as well as Queen who desperately needed an heir….imagine her unhappiness for so many years…!
At 0:06. The Brits and Belgians were ruled by the Saxe-Coburg-Gothas. The Germans by the Hohenzollerns. The Austro-Hungarians by the Hapbsburgs. The Russians by the Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorps (though they pretended to be Romanov). The Danes, Norwegians and Greeks by the Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburgs. I don't know the rest. But I do know that Luxembourg was ruled not by a German family, but by a French one--the Bourbon-Parmas. The ruling house of Luxembourg pretends to be German, just like the ruling house of Russia pretended to be Russian or the ruling house of the UK pretends to be British.
0:20 - Not all of French-speaking Europe was unified, just most of it. Some francophones lived (and still do) in Belgium, Luxembourg, Monaco and Switzerland.
Fun fact about the renaming of the UK Royal Family. It was done in 1917 specifically because the Germans began using a large, twin engined biplane bomber called the “Gotha” bomber. They were already under pressure to sound less Germanic but having an enemy bomber (who’s first raid hit a school and killed dozens of children) was really awful optics so boom. Renamed Windsor after their castle and the Royal borough in Berkshire. A place with a thousand years of English-British Royal history going back to William I. A similar course was undertaken by Prince Albert, who, due to increasing tensions with Germany in the 30s would rule as George VI, taking on the name of his very popular Father George V. Who also navigated Britain and her empire through the hardships of WW1 and the great depression. We saw us through WW2 and was the last British monarch to hold the title of Emperor of India.
Me as a romanian,i have to say that this is one of the worst thing we had to do,the romanian rulers , Alexandru Ioan Cuza was an amazing guy,he did so many things in such a short time,was kicked out because he wanted some changes for the better of the people that would hurt the rich,he did make some of them true Also the german guy,he was not the first choice,first was a french guy (don't remember the name) but he refused. Even so,our german kind was amazingly fit for the job,so much things were done thanks to him but some reform that the original king started were put on hold until his successor.
The US considered having a German (Prussian) monarch very briefly when we floated the idea of monarchy after getting independence. The logic being, a Prussian Prince would make the US more legitimate than crowning Washington.
After the revolution, the only person the American people liked more than Washington was God, and even that’s debatable. You must mean international legitimacy, because internally everyone was more than fine with Washington ruling, whether it be as president or king.
@@DovahFett Of course I meant international legitimacy. European monarchs would not have seen Washington as an equal, even though he would have been the popular choice among the people. There was also the fact WAshington himself did not want to be a monarch, where as European nobility would have been much more open to it. The US went republican anyway though so in the end it didn't matter, but it's a fun bit of trivia.
Many of these German royal families were related because of queen Victoria. Her family was the Hanovers(descendant) from George I. She married prince Albert of the family that became Windsor. They then proceeded to I think 14 children who then married into nearly every royal family in Europe. Many of the children of these unions then married their cousins in other royal families. Most famous example Nicholas II and Alexandra of Russia who were first cousins. Also the family resemblance between Kaiser Wilhelm II, Nicholas II, and Edward VII is very weird. It's often hard to tell one from the other without captions.
And that was just with a few cousin marriages. Now think of the Ptolemies and Cleopatras in Egypt, something like 4-5 generations of sister marrying brother ... that would likely be even more like clones ...
Honestly, the Eastern Roman / Greek system was far more rational and modern than the Holy Roman / Western system, based as it was on a strong centralized bureaucracy, centrally-controlled army and centrally-administered taxation. In West Europe it was only the remarkable Philip IV of France who managed to build a strong centralized state during the Middle Ages (he's the one who crushed the Knights Templar and made the Pope his servant). The vast lands of the Holy Roman Empire, from Marseille in the Mediterranean to Silesia in Poland, never managed that.
That’s also due to it being an Empire that basically started out of an alliance of different tribes/people. Therefor the HRE had the elector count system (Kurfürsten in German) which led to basically a federal state in which certain nobles almost had as much power as the emperor. Taking in new people after conquering their territories did not help with that problem. It was compatible to the Italians who also had state cities fighting for dominance with the exception that the HRE was a unifying system whilst Italian cities did not have one in place (many of which were also part of the HRE at some point) Basically the HRE was a minority state and very heteromorph and accepting. It’s no wonder that it used to also have a very big Jewish population. The homogeneous teachings of Germany started probably only in the 16th century and gave rise to a national idea only in the 18/19th century. They peeked in WW2 as you might guess.
@@Schwachsinnn You make some good points, and I agree on some of them, such as the tolerance and federalism, which are also relevant in the context of the EU today. But after some point, the HRE was a clear anomaly that held Europe back. The Habsburg Emperor was nominally the most prestigious European monarch, but basically didn't care about the empire, only about his Austrian domains that could be actually controlled. The Germans and the Italians should be both thankful to Napoleon. Without him, I think neither of them would have achieved national unity. In these two countries you had, as late as 1800, things like theocratic republics or oligarchic city-states
@@giannb5145 You are saying that like existing as a myriad of countries, more like the Baltics, Balkan or Benelux would be worse than being the heirs Adolf & Benito's realms...
1:39 "when all things german suddenly became less popular" made me giggle for almost a minute. 😂😂😂 It's these subtle and intelligent jokes that require a little historical knowledge, that made me subscribe. Kepp up with the great work!
At 3:13 the mentioning of Peter of Bragança it's a fun fact. He was by then Emperor Peter I of Brazil, King Peter IV of Portugal and missed to be Peter I of Greece. Certainly he would have a video of his own had him achieved this three crown feat.
Marrying German royalty was usually a good option because then you could get someone who: 1) Wasn't closely related to you 2) Didn't have significant de facto power of their own and was less likely to be able to overthrow you (although this wasn't a guarantee, Catherine the Great was able to overthrow Peter III even though her only connection to the Russian throne was her marriage to him)
Ironically, Catherine managed to overthrow her husband by appearing more Russian than him to the Russian aristorcracy (Peter III was on board with making Russia to be more like Prussia, unlike Catherine)
Fun fact: the last Bulgarian tsar (Simeon II) who held this title for a very short time (from his father’s death in 1943 until the communist revolution in 1944) actually became prime minister of Bulgaria and served as such from 2001-2005. I was a young kid when it happened but I remember how much people used to talk about it. It’s not every day a monarch comes back to his country some 60 years later to be elected democratically lol
Geez, how old was he as Tsar to live all the way to 2005??
@@joshuahunt3032 Simeon II was 5 years old when he took the throne and when Bulgaria became a communist state, I believe, though what is certain though is that he was below the age of 8 when the later years of WW2 were happening
Happens more often than you think lol. People love stories like that and a complacent populace loves dynastic worship. Just look at how many of American presidents share a last name: the plebians love that kind of continuity compared to just voting in 'unknowns' everytime.
The other issue is Batenberg's rule wasn't ended because he was terrible, it was ended because his relations with Alexander III were far worse than those with Alexander II. He ruled autocratically with Russian troop backing for a while until with the backing of Bulgarian politicians exiled to Southern Rumelia he did a counter coup against the Russian generals... And then we get the Bulgarian Serb war, 4 Russian backed coup attempts, the Russian Black Sea fleet trying to intimidate Varna, the Stambolov led regency and only then Ferdinand.
@@joshuahunt3032 He is still living. He is 85 years old.
Day one of asking : What was the world's reaction to the discovery of dinosaur fossils? Nice topic by the way!
I feel like we've known about dinosaur fossils for millenia, attributing them to mythical beings. Would still be interesting to see our interpretation of them over the years though.
Would be so cool
I imagine the reaction was pretty bare bones.
Pun intended moment
Bone Wars intensify
Queen Victoria was also German, it's been reported that her and Wilhelm the second and other families would speak German in private conversations
Naturlich. Was sprechen die zu hause....but British propaganda was vicious. They were yeloous that the grandson wilhelm. Also wanted some colonies..etc...now British are always great with propaganda. The germans. Are babykillers. The huns.....their language is tooo GUTERAL...etc. all in to the war of USA....we all know the story.. the germans. Starter war1. Opera winfree.....ha ha ha...i love you all...and I have to stand also for DEUTSCHLA ND Th e British always whisper into the war of USA. Remember. Special
I believe her mother couldn't speak English so yes, Victoria would have been fluent in German
*British born to a German princess
If Victoria is German, then that means Charles is Greek...
@@jl63023victoria’s mum was German, Charles’ great grandfather was Greek. Slight difference
@@dylanmurphy9389 Prince Philip was born in Greece to a Greek family, thus making Charles "Greek" by this logic
My favorite bit of related history is that the Swedish Royal Family are not Swedish or even German but French as the throne was offered to one of Napoleons Marshals Jean Bernadotte who started off his career as a Private soldier.
And then later switched sides to have Sweden fight against France.
He wasn't even noble by birth.
@@bliblablubb9590 well that was Napoleonic of him.
The current queen of Sweden is German, though, so the next Swedish monarch will be half-German.
Wow good for Jean, joined the army and ended up being a king. Sigma grindset
In case any of you were wondering about the other European monarchs: Spain and Sweden were ruled by French dynasties, Portugal by a double-bastard line of a French dynasty (later German), Italy was ruled by a Franco-Italian dynasty, while Serbia, Montenegro, and the Ottoman Empire had their own native dynasties.
Edit 1: the Netherlands was technically ruled by a German dynasty, but apparently they became Dutch enough that History Matters didn't include them here, Luxembourg was also ruled by a German, later French dynasty, Liechtenstein was German, and Monaco was Italian.
Edit 2: Actually, the Monegasque dynasty was technically French in the male line, but like the imperial house of Russia, they kept their original family name, which was Grimaldi, Italian in origin.
Edit 3: Albania was also ruled by a German dynasty briefly in 1914, but the prince only lived in the country for a couple of months before he fled due to a rebellion, and after a period of turmoil, they chose their own native king.
Edit 4: Also of note is that after the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, Germany had plans to have Finland, Lithuania, and Livonia have their own German monarchies, while Ukraine would be ruled by its own native dynasty, but that plan didn't work out for obvious reasons.
Edit 5: Actually, Portugal was also ruled by a German dynasty from 1837 to 1910, the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, the difference being that they kept the Braganza name.
Edit 6: The Habsburg dynasty of the 19th century wasn't just Habsburg, it was the house of Habsburg-Lorraine, descended agnatically from the House of Lorraine, a region between Germany and France. Like the House of Savoy, I think it can be best described as Franco-German.
Thats a lot of edits. And in 25 minutes. Congrats, especially for your talk about the plethora of dynasties.
Euro's really love their blue-blood leaders eh
Thank you for remembering that our insignificant region in the east of france exists
Why was italy's dynasty Franco-Italian? Wasn't it just Italian?
French/Franks like anglo saxons are just Germans in denial.
Great vid! Btw the first Bulgarian Prince was long-thought of being "terrible" as the video said, mainly because he was fighting for independence from Russia. The history available is usually written during the communist period and describes him as such, but recent evidence shows that he was actually very popular and not that terrbile at all.
Fun fact, the last emperor of Brazil was also from a German family, because his mother was emperatriz Leopoldina, from the house of Habsburg
But his father was braganza..actually an illegitimate branch of the French Capetian dynasty
Don't forget the short lived emperor of Mexico. It's crazy.
Kinda doesn't count. When talking about if a country's royal family is German, what you're really talking about if the ruling house has a German name.
In the Brazilian case, the ruling house was a Portugese branch of the house of Burgundy.
So despite Pedro II having a German mother, he was of a Portugese house. If you squint Franco-Portugese.
Actually, the last emperor of Brazil wasn't German, but Austrian - There's a big difference there! Austrians are Germanic (which has nothing to do with the country Germany or being German), but not German!
@@Nightmare-fq1vv
Absolutely wrong and just pure copium.
Austrians are very much Germans. They're just like Fyromians; drip fed propaganga since the end ofWW2 to pretend they're their own people. In the Fyromians case, they pretend they're not Bulgarians. Austrians on the other hand pretend they're not German.
Austrian "identity" literally just revolves around saying how not German they are(a sign they're not a real group).
I already know you're counterargument: "aCkShUaLly, AuStRiA iS oLdEr ThAn GeRmAnY". No shit sherlock. That's because Germany was founded in 1871 on the principle of uniting the *many* German states under one country. Austria was just one them. In fact, Austria competed with Prussia as to be the one state in which the Germans rally under.
So just because a country called Austria existed for a few centuries does not mean they're a nation. It's like trying to argue Hannoverians or Holsteiners are not German but their own group.
One of my favorite ones so far! All of the connections between the royal houses of Europe makes the Great War even more fascinating, as it was more or less a family feud gone wrong
It goes back much farther than WWI.
Terribly gone wrong i would add
Dont worry everything stays im family
@@Cykler770 ...until it doesn't (sound of shots in the distance)
Yes
Some corrections about 🇩🇰 Denmark:
Christoffer III was also from a German family; he was actually born in Bavaria to the house of Wittelsbach. Furthermore, Christoffer was the third monarch of the Kalmar Union who died childless; before him was Queen Margrethe I (House of Estridsen) and King Erik VII (House of Griffin).
It's correct that the Oldenburg Dynasty still rules Denmark (and Norway) today. However the main branch died out with the childless King Frederik VII in 1863. The current branch is called Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg and is only remotely related to the original branch (through Duke John (Hans) II of Schleswig, who was a younger brother of King Frederik II of Denmark).
Finally, I want to point out that Denmark officially was an elective monarchy until 1665 during the reign of King Frederik III. However, in the latter years it was widely regarded as a formality as the King's oldest son was almost always elected as the new king.
Nørd.
but didnt both Christoffer III and Christian I come from a danish heritage, i believe they can be traced back to the oldest king of Denmark
@@missa2855 Kind of a self-own if “Nørd” translates to “Nerd”, isn’t it?
So Peter wasn’t lying about being related to a danish king. Erik Griffen
@@magnus9145we're talking about male line
The Germans sure do get around…be it their royals, their corporations, their amazing goods, ooooor their armies. They know how to go international!
Uhm yea this is gonna be the top comment
True, although the first 3 have a much better track record than the last one lol
Here before this blow up
German semen is the best in ze world!
Or their words, their food, their movies, etc.
Finland too wanted a German king when it got Independence in 1917. It was a sort of thank you to Germany for their assistance in The Finnish civil war.
Candidates were numerous, including the Crown Prince of Germany, who the Kaiser refused as he kinda needs and heir too. So we landed with Friedrich Karl of Hessen, the Kaiser's brother in law. Corinations were set and Friedrich was packing his bags until Germany lost WW1. And the Finns boldly stated that they don't speak loser.
So then they just said "F*ck it, guess we'll be a republic"
Maybe Friedrich should have gotten rid of that yee yee ass haircut
That would’ve definitely made relationships with the newly made Soviet Union more complex then they were already before.
Damn, poor Friedrich
Based finns
I mean Germany wanted it, most Finns didn’t actually accept Friederich
When you do a deep dive, ALL European royal houses are related to each other and married again into each other. The Spanish royals married the Portuguese, English, Austrian, French, Italian and German states, Belgian, Danish, Dutch royal houses or nobility. And because the Spanish descended German speaking Austrian based Habsburgs married into various other German speaking states royal houses, along with Polish, French, and Italian houses, they completed circles when the Germans married into the English royal house again.
Marie Antoinette for example had Austrian, Spanish, Italian, Bavarian ancestry (including the Medicis as ancestors) among others. So did her husband French King Louis XVI. Henry VIII of England was already the descendant of a Spanish princess who wed an English king earlier in the 1200s, when Henry himself was married to another Spanish princes Catherine of Aragon, the daughter of Queen Isabella of Castile in the 1500s. And his relatives, who took over (and Scottish rivals) carried the same lineage, and then married into the German, Portuguese, Scandinavian, and Spanish royal houses--again.
And the Austrian Habsburgs as mentioned married many times into other German speaking states whether it was Bavaria, Saxony, Württemberg, etc. who in turn married into further German speaking nobility in other German states. Then these German royals and nobility married into French houses like Burgundy or Sweden, or Bohemians (Czechia). The French in turn married with the Spanish for centuries, the English and Scots, Luxembourg, north Italian states, as well as already established German states.
One big European family going round and round.
Yeah, the genetics of all European high nobility was basically a - surprisingly small - bush, going back to a small collection of families being able to grab power during Late Antiquity to at latest the HIgh Middle Ages. Fresh blood was rare (unless some woman cheated and we don't know) as marrying even low nobles was an outrage as late as the early 1900s (Franz Ferdinand's Sophie comes to mind).
except Ottomans. (Before anyone start Turkey is not Europe etc, Ottomans were major actors in European politics until the end)
But Ottomans at the beginning married Roman and some Balkan princesses though. Back in 14th and 15th centuries. They stopped marrying outside later and married to slave girls because the family didn't want to share any power
@cmfrtblynmb02 After the 1400s the Ottomans sort of became a bit less relevant in western Europe until WWI. Catholicism was what united the royals in western and Central Europe. Even after the Protestant movements, Christianity as a whole was still very central to most European royal houses. Many convents for instance were sponsored by royalty. Let's not mention the Crusades. The Ottoman empire was Muslim and there was no chance of arranged marriages between the Christian west and Muslim east who were often seen as enemies of the faith.
The Age of Exploration also created new world empires led by the Spanish, English, Portuguese, Dutch, and French.
And after that, the Enlightenment, Industrial Revolution, and reunification movements propped up the Austrians, Germans, Italians, and Britain and France again to global powers. It was mainly among those countries where the royals mixed and matched. Poland, Russia, and Scandinavia being on the periphery but still geographically close also had some royal marriage spillover since they were also Christian countries.
Southeast Europe on the other hand, even Greece, let alone the Ottomans, had were sort of blocked off by the Austro-Hungarian empire and the fact that the Ottomans were of an entirely different religion which during the Middle Ages and even into modernity are central to European royals (many countries for instance didn't allow marriage outside Catholicism for royals; still true for British royals regards Anglicans).
@@danmur2797 I see your points but some I don't agree. if religion was real hurdle, ottoman sultans would not be able to marry some Serbian and byzantine princesses. I think until Mehmed II, Ottoman sultans had those kinds of marriages
It is more the case of house of Othman decided not to get married outside. There were literally hundreds of princesses that were waiting to be married and one of them would be sent to house of Othman, I am pretty sure. Besides a Christian woman don't have to convert to get married to a Muslim men. A lot of royalty in Europe would like an ally like Ottomans who were still a major power until like 1800.
But house of Othman decided to close their family to outside after the instability happened after death of Bayezid I. They even stopped marrying to Turkish or other Muslim houses. They decided to create the institution of harem which was opened up to slave girls (so that these girls had no family or no ties)
So it is not only that they shunned other royals as marriage prospects. They wanted women who had no relatives at all. This is clearly a decision that comes from their side
Otherwise I honestly don't believe if an Ottoman sultan told they wanted to some German house to be tied to. There were hundreds of royal houses in the holy Roman empire, one would be more than happy to send one daughter.dont tell me there is not one king or prince didn't want Süleyman I as his son in law. The guy basically ruled the biggest land army and the biggest armada in Mediterranean sea. It was USA of his day.
@cmfrtblynmb02 I don't think you understand.
The royals of Europe answered to the pope in Rome. They supported the pope. They died for Christianity/Catholic beliefs. They even went to war over Protestantism when some began to break with the Catholic Church. They wanted to consolidate power within a Christian kingdom. Marrying off a daughter or son to a Muslim kingdom offered them no benefit. And especially if they were one among many wives at the same time which, although not unheard off, a harem was not the norm.
Aside from that geography also played a part. The seat of the Ottoman Empire was far
Small correction regarding 🇬🇷
Otto of Bavaria (or Otto of Greece) was chosen by the Great Powers after the assassination of our first president Ioannis Kapodistrias. He turned out to be quite unpopular with his Greek subjects, and also seemed like he couldn't have children, so he was deposed in 1862 ( the latter of which probably played a bigger role).
To replace him the Greeks at first wanted to nominate the future king of the UK, Prince Alfred but his nomination was refused by the Great Powers. So they went to their 2nd choice, Prince William of Denmark of the house of Glücksburg, who as mentioned in the video, were also German.
Prince Alfred was the second son of Victoria and Albert. Their first son was crown prince Albert, known better as King Edward VII. He would play a role however because he was married to William/George's sister in the same year he became king of Greece which thus created a close connection to the United Kingdom anyway as the crown princess/queen of the UK would be the sister of the king of Greece
With Byzantine roots
I once read an article how Otto was arriving in Greece. He had a classical educated entourage that knew ancient Greek and seriously attempted to rule the country as if it was some ancient country. One observer commented that ruling Greece like this is like ruling a German kingdom with the language of Walter von der Vogelweide.
Also they commented that the country was extremely destroyed after the war of independence. "this is how Germany must have looked like after the thirty years war."
Since reading that I am in love with the idea of visiting Rome and attempting to do all my orders in Latin.
Kapodistrias was killed by a greek merchant family because they hated him for reasons. Most greeks had no idea what was happening at the time.
Glucksburg is a cadet branch of house Oldenburg
Fun fact:
The last Bulgarian Tsar (he fled in 1946) Simeon of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha was later a freely elected prime minister.
Hey atleast modern leaders are tech. In a very big nutshell, the same as monarchs. Just with different name and concept of ruling.
There's nothing funny about that fact!
Don’t forget the very short period where a Habsburg was Emperor of Mexico
What!? 😦😦
Iike the saxe-coburg gotha in Brazil empire
For three years only and then he was executed and the republic was restored.
@@Nicolas25165 What? Do you mean Pedro II.? His mother was from the House of Habsburg, the daughter of the Austrian Emperor. But his house is still that of Braganza because of his father.
Idk where you got Saxe-coburg and gotha from
@@Icetea-2000 Dom Pedro Augusto and Augusto Leopoldo, grandchilds of Pedro II
Alright, here we go:
UK - House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha
Belgium - Same as above
Bulgaria - Same as above
Denmark - House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (Branch of the House of Oldenburg)
Norway - Same as above
Greece - Same as above
Russia - House of Holstein-Gottorp-Romanov
Albania - House of Wied-Neuwied
Austria - House of Habsburg-Lorraine
Romania - House of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen
Germany - 21 states and dynasties, some of whose monarchs were agnatic relatives, just ruled by different branches of their families
Kingdoms:
Prussia - House of Hohenzollern
Bavaria - House of Wittelsbach
Württemberg - House of Württemberg
Saxony - House of Wettin (most junior Wettin line)
Grand Duchies:
Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach - House of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach (2nd of the Ernestine Houses)
Oldenburg - House of Oldenburg (offshoot of the House of Holstein-Gottorp, most junior branch of the entire Oldenburg dynasty)
Baden - House of Zähringen
Hesse - House of Hesse-Darmstadt
Mecklenburg-Schwerin - House of Mecklenburg Schwerin (senior line of the House of Mecklenburg)
Mecklenburg-Strelitz - House of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (junior line of the House to Mecklenburg)
Duchies:
Brunswick - House of Hanover
Anhalt - House of Ascania
Saxe-Altenburg - House of Saxe-Altenburg (most senior branch of the entire Wettin dynasty, 1st of the Ernestine houses)
Saxe-Meiningen - House of Saxe-Meiningen (3rd of the Ernestine houses)
Saxe-Coburg and Gotha - House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (4th of the Ernestine houses)
Principalities:
Lippe(-Detmold) - House of Lippe (Lippe-Biesterfeld line)
Schaumburg-Lippe - House of Schaumburg-Lippe
Reuss-Gera - House of Reuss-Gera (junior line of the Reuss family)
Reuss-Greiz - House of Reuss-Greiz (senior line of the Reuss family)
Waldeck and Pyrmont - House of Waldeck and Pyrmont
Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt and Schwarzburg-Sondershausen - House of Schwarzburg (Sondershausen line extinct with the death of Charles Gonthier, Prince of Schwarzburg-Sondershausen in 1909, states not merged due to political opposition from their constituent state assemblies)
And then Prince Philip of Greece (House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg) through his marriage to Elizabeth Windsor (Saxe-Coburg and Gotha) made the UK monarchy even MORE German.
@@rsr789 You say “even more” as if it’s that much. Elizabeth II wasn’t even fully half German
@@Edmonton-of2ec elizabethh II was just half scottish by her mother side and just this, she was fully german by her father side.
@@nazaninnadi7456 Still wrong. Elizabeth’s paternal grandmother’s paternal grandmother was Hungarian.
So no mention of Germany then?
Technically the Dutch royal family is also German, originally being from the town of Nassau.
...and Bernhard and Claus made sure they stay German
technically Royal families are welfare recipients.
Luxembourg and Liechtenstein too.
@@GrouRocks To be more specific, Duke Henry of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld, and Prince Claus von Amsberg were all German princes/nobles who married Queens Wilhelmina, Juliana, and Beatrix respectively. In the case of the latter, his marriage was met with protests due to lingering anti-German sentiment from WWII and the fact that von Amsberg had been a member of the Hitler Youth.
@@angusyang5917
Correction: Claus was a soldier in the Wehrmacht in 1944-1945. The details of his time as a 'Totenkopf' were carefully erased from the historic record by the powers that be.
The one thing I like about this channel more than any others, it can get everything into 5 minutes that take other channels 20 minutes to a half hour or more
After viewing this episode, it now makes perfect sense why French Emperor Napoleon III sent the Austrian Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian Joseph of the House of Habsburg to be Emperor of Mexico in 1863. Thanks History Matters!
Does @ actually do anything on UA-cam?
@@pomeranianproductions647 besides using the reply button idk
@@pomeranianproductions647 I think you have to directly reply to someone, so no. People who use it just look silly.
@@Ludovicus1769 it also works on lives to tag a person or sth
It was actually under his recommendation that the Hohenzollerns got the Romanian throne. The Romanian elite of the time was hugely Francophile so they requested the Emperor pick a candidate
Always love these! I can't tell if it's just me or not but I've really been enjoying how it seems the output of new videos has been more frequent recently!
Ikr
On the subject of Germany, one thing History Matters could explore in the near future is why there are so many descendants of ethnic Germans in the United States today (they are literally in the top two ethnic groups last I checked). A number were in Pennsylvania among other areas even before the American Revolution, and then an explosion of immigration from German lands happened in the 1800s. I myself am largely of German descent, though it's mixed with Scottish/British and French. It would be fascinating to hear more about.
@@thunderbird1921 I also think this would be an interesting subject for a video! No specific reason lol
James must be throwing more money around.
To elaborate, topography played a large role. Germany, being basically a mountainous country, made it difficult for lords and other royals to overtake one another. German states, separated by mountains and rivers, were able to remain independent and defend themselves against each other. This made it possible for royals in small fiefdoms, to maintain their positions. Some castles were mere yards from each other. This is also why the German language has so many dialects and accents. Peoples were separated and their languages evolved differently.
Half of Germany is plains. You can literally tell the "border" between the mountain/hill part and the plains part not only from how the people speak, but kinda from the type of sausage (no 100% overlap).
Weird to exclude the Dutch royal family. The first line of their national anthem mentions that William of Orange is of German blood... They continually married with Prussians and other German houses, kept ruling Nassau (in Germany...) even when they got kicked out of the Netherlands. They were reinstated by the Vienna Congress and thus slightly before the Greek got their independence.
dutch are basically german tho..........
He also excluded Albania as well, although that's more understandable since their German monarchy didn't last more than half a year. He also forgot Portugal, who ruled by the same royal house as Britain, Belgium, and Bulgaria.
The mention of German(Duits) has little to do with germany itself. The word used is Duytschen wich comes from Diets meaning poeple or of the poeple. The Nassua part is true tough.
Kinda the Albanian thing....if yer not from the village, yer a target, let alone foreigners, 🤣
When the dutch national athem was written there was no such as germany or being german, at the time “duits” was just an ambrulla term meaning germanic people groups. That is also the reason why people from the Netherlands are called dutch in english
I was actually quite surprised that Queen Victoria didn't get brought up. I know she loved marrying off her family so was curious if this was going to be a factor or not.
She's how the Hanoverian dynasty became the Saxe-Coburg Gotha/Windsor one; granddaughter of George III, therefore descended from the German George I, she married Albert, a German Prince.
@@louisduarte8763 She had a German accent too, contrary to how she was portrayed by Emily Blunt and Jenna Coleman.
@@silenthunteruk This is the first I've ever heard of that. May I ask where you got that information from? Because even though Victoria was technically a member of the German house of Hannover, that house had ruled and lived in the UK for over a century by the time she was born and was pretty much britizised - so much that Victorias uncle Ernest Augustus who ruled in Germany as King of Hannover still regarded himself as Englishman years after he had left England and taken the throne of Hannover. The members of the royal house of Hannover in that time spoke English as a mothertongue so it seems odd that any of them would've had a German accent - especially as Victoria had no ties to Germany and as far as I know never even visited German lands during her childhood (I believe Hannover she never visited ar all).
@@shimanopetermann9068 It came up during the airing of 'Victoria', but seems to be debatable. Never really proven either way - no audio confirmed to be of her exists.
Mendelssohn said that the Queen spoke good German, which would indicate that she spoke it as a foreign language, presumably with an English accent, rather than that German was prevelant and meant she spoke English with a German accent-I am not aware that anyone has suggested George III, George IV or William IV spoke English with a German accent, so why should Victoria?
Here in Spain the monarch has also a great ammount of german ancestry, back to the Hapsbusrgs and from more recent times, being son of a greek princess from the german house of Glücksburg
That‘s true despite one correction: The House of Habsburg was never German but Austrian!
@@piffpaff9674 Actually the dinsty is Swiss technically speaking, either way its still a german culture family.
The Habsburgs were German.
I wish you’d do a whole documentary about this topic. I find absolutely fascinating.
A striking omission of royal families of German extraction is the Orange-Nassau dynasty of the Netherlands. 6 out of 8 great-grandparents of Queen Wilhelmina, who reigned in 1914, were born in Germany to German noble families, a seventh (Paul I of Russia) was from a family that you do label as German, and of the eighth, William I of the Netherlands, all eight great-grandparents were born in Germany. If that family is not German, I cannot think what family is. (Side note: when a couple of years ago Willem-Alexander, the current king, spoke German at a televised event, Dutch commentators commended him for his impeccable German. I found that amazing, given that his father was German, as was his grandfather on his mother's side. In fact, Wilhelmina is the only one of his great-grandparents not born in Germany.)
Historically there was no distinction between Dutch and German on the previous centuries. The connection becomes even clearer when you compare Dutch to Liw German. Both Germans and Dutch are a fusion of various Germanic tribes i.a. Franks, Saxons, Frisians etc.
@@marchauchler1622 You are not wrong, of course. The Dutch Royal family only became royal, however, in 1815, by which time a significant difference between what are now Germany and the Netherlands was present. Barring the dialect continuum along the border of the two countries there was little mutual intelligibility between the languages, and there was a history of centuries of political separation (at least since 1648 the Netherlands were not part of the Holy Roman Empire).
King Willhelm Alexander is also a qualified International Air lines Pilot !
@@marchauchler1622 there definitely began to develop a distinction from the 17th century onwards, in Wilhelmina's time there was already a clear difference about as much (if not more) than today. (Speaking about how they are viewed, not linguistically inherently, then we can go back earlier.)
However, the most prominent name of the Dutch royal family, i.e. 'of orange', which was not adopted to suit the sensibilities of the population like the UK or Russia (it really was only translated) is French. So it can be argued that the family is French, even if the second, lesser known part of the family name is German.
3:29 I always appreciate how much research he does. Very few know that "Stroopwafels are delicious" was one of the mottos of the Dutch speaking peoples
The Dutch speaking peoples? I’ve lived in Belgium for whole my life, but never have I seen anyone eating a “stroopwafel”, while in the Netherlands that’s one of the main snacks I see. Belgium is more famous for its normal waffles (Brussels and Liégeois, the two types are even named after Belgian city’s)
One small correction: prince Carol of House of Hohenzollern (later known as king Carol the First) became prince of Romania in 1866 after Alexandru Ioan Cuza (the Romanian ruler mentioned in the video) was overthrown by a coalition of radical liberals and conservatives. At that time, Romania was still under Ottoman domination.
We gained independence in 1879 after allying ourselves with Russia in a war against the Ottoman Empire.
Charles I radiated Gigachad-raw-manliness energy. If this man entered this room right now and tells me that he is the king now, my answer would be: "as you wish, your majesty." Look him up and tell me that you would react differently
To be fair European monarchies were like student exchange programs.
A good way of thinking about inter-marriages among royal families! Thanks for the comment!
😂😆
and redneck family, because they marry each others only !
Still are
Love how detailed this video is. And your maps are amazingly on point as always.
I once read an article how Otto was arriving in Greece. He had a classical educated entourage that knew ancient Greek and seriously attempted to rule the country as if it was some ancient country. One observer commented that ruling Greece like this is like ruling a German kingdom with the language of Walter von der Vogelweide.
Also they commented that the country was extremely destroyed after the war independence. "this is how Germany must have looked like after the thirty years war."
Since reading that I am in love with the idea of visiting Rome and attempting to do all my orders in Latin.
vulgar latin? or classical? do consider recording and uploading on youtube :)
Herrlich...
That is both very intelligent and witty! Besides: The Bavarian house of Wittelsbach unfortunately produced some very romantic princes who were just not made for a real kingdom with its heavy crowns…
there's a video of a guy on youtube who does exactly this. And no wonder, no Italian has a fuckin clue what he is saying.
@@Apokalypse456 There is classical and ecclesiastical (Medieval/Church) Latin, Vulgar Latin is a very imprecise and historically contested term :)
from a German perspective marrying into these houses was very attractive for several reasons:
the options of increasing your rank within the holy roman empire were limited. Since the holy roman empire already had a king there was no way to become a king of a state that was a part of the empire (apart form the king of bohemia, who was also a Habsburg). A kingdom within a kingdom makes no sense and a country that already has a king can't have a second one. So the only way to legally become a king is by marrying into a family from another country
Increasing one's rank was important for reasons of prestige but also had real world implications. I.e. a lower ranking noble had harder access to even get an audience with a higher ranking one. In case they got one then the entire procedure left no doubt that they were less important: like they have to sit on a simpler, less comfortable chair, while the higher ranking one had the best seat. Also the sitting order was different, often you wouldn't even be invited to important meatings etc. etc. etc. The chances of even being heard by the more powerful people therefore diminished, which means that these monarchs simply had not an equal say when important decisions were made. It really changed the real power these monarchs had. it is no surprise therefore that people were really obsessed with prestigious titles, ranks, orders etc. Their whole world and their social status depended on these things.
Btw. the fact that German families couldn't become kings/czars/emperors etc. also motivated them to become kings of something else. in 1697 the electorate prince of saxony became also king of Poland and established a personal union which lasted for 66 years between the two countries. In1701 the electorate prince of Brandenburg became king in Prussia ( later of Prussia). And as already mentioned in the video in 1714 the electorate prince of Hannover became king of Great Britain. This way these monarchs could increase their ranks and also become more powerful players in Germany and Europe despite the fact that their native countries weren't that important. P.S.: plenty of kings from other kings also ruled some territories within the holy Roman empire without their core regions being a part of it. That would be Sweden and Denmark, later Britain.
On the side of the countries they married into: The German monarchs were actually quite good, because they tachnically were rulers of some independent place which was seen as a good thing, since marrying an actual ruler was seen as better than someone who only rules in name or doesn't even rule a place at all. Many of the German families were not particularly wealthy, maybe on par with English gentry, and were therefor no threat to anyone's power. Sometimes they were accepted because that means that they are easier to control and also more likely to actually rule in the interest of their new country since it is much more important than their home country. If you had married a french, spanish or russian member of the royal family than they might have acted only in the interest of their old coutnry and your country ends up being a colony of a greater power. Also an unimportant German family is probably more willing to assimilate to the rules of the new country since they are happy to finally actually rule some place. Furthermore German dynasties had different religions, like protestantism, catholicism and reformed. You could always find someone of your religion to marry or who was willing to convert, which was always the case if the country was orthodox.
PS: btw. I have a huge man-crush on the first Hohenzollern king of Romania: Charles I . He radiated Gigachad-raw-manliness energy. If this man entered this room right now and tells me that he is the king now my answer would be: "as you wish, your majesty." Look him up and tell me that you would react differently
National hero of Romania and military reformer right?
where did you learn all this, I would also like to understand like you the history of these noble "game of thrones"
@@Tendedsheeep hope hell answer
As a Romanian that bit about Carol I was really funny😂😂 (that's how we called him, feels wrong to say otherwise)
Hoch lebe.Deutschland
You guys are truly wonderful and deserve a reward for making such amusing, informative, memorable yet succinct clips. Kudos!
Wish you well and hope schools and other learning institutions workdwide discover you. And of course curious young minds whose horizons you will surely broaden😊
Video idea as a loyal Patreon supporter: Why was Finland 🇫🇮 given autonomy in the Russian Empire
they fought for it. Multiple times.
@Geralt of Pimpland sorry typo
@Geralt of Pimpland "Paterson is a 2016 drama film written and directed by Jim Jarmusch. The film stars Adam Driver as a bus driver and poet named Paterson, and Golshifteh Farahani as his wife, who dreams of being a country music star and opening a cupcake business. "
Because the Finnish really didn't like Russia and Finland would have been the absolute worst place to have rebellions in. Autonomy was the easiest way to keep the Finns satisfied
@@mav8535 Ironically, it was the lack of Finnish rebellions that kept it autonomous for so long. Russia had control over Finland, and they weren't rebelling, so unlike Poland, they adopted a "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" attitude, at least until the 1890s.
This was one of my most favourite videos, I always found it fascinating how so many of Europe’s monarchies had German roots or German blood
I will never understand why Europeans (and some other nations) were so inclined to install a monarch or ruler of “royal breed”, even a foreign one, before a local. That’s like the dumbest thing I can think of.
so, i need to complain about it somewhere. the belgians pocked their king in a great big congress after disagreeing a lot. so did the greeks btw as leopold 1 previously refused the greek throne and then we snatched him up
and as explained by a shitton of people the netherlands also have a german monarchy
@@davidcervantes9336 like the King of Greece being Danish
@@davidcervantes9336 Because it's important to install one of 'your own' to safeguard the monarchies' interests, and also because of habit. Installing a local only serves to bring the country further away from europe's 'collective' interests.
@@davidcervantes9336
you wrote this under other comments too.
Is there a little provocation going on? Or a little jealousy?
And NO, having a good King ruling over a nation is not dumb - it is the smartest thing you can have, actually.
Here in Ireland, several leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising (for which the Germans attempted to send a shipment of weapons which were intercepted by the British) considered the idea of crowning Kaiser Wilhelm II's youngest son Joachim the King of Ireland, despite of being members of the Irish REPUBLICAN Brotherhood.
Dont be a femboy Keltoid, make your dad proud
@@jaklm4221 daddy is proud.
Also they should've crowned Joachim it was the right move we could've avoided a stupid civil war.
Bunkum 👆
Wow I never heard that before. What crazy times!
Finland also crowned a German Prince after declaring independence.
Love how basically all monarchys of europe are german but germany itself doesn’t have a monarchy
I mean France and Italy also had ton of monarchs in other countries
Well it had, but not anymore.
I will never understand why Europeans (and some other nations) were so inclined to install a monarch or ruler of “royal breed”, even a foreign one, before a local. That’s like the dumbest thing I can think of.
@@davidcervantes9336 in order to get a guarantee or an alliance
@@thefarmking9924 it’s obvious that nobles were only selling their subjects to the better bidder.
Can you talk about that time Britain wanted to colonize Siberia?
I live in Siberia, I would like to hear about it
What the hell? When did they want siberia?
Serbia you mean?
@@mojewjewjew4420 16th century and early 17th century. They Russia started looking to the east and found forest full of furry little creatures which were pritty much money printing machines. British quickly noticed and established their trade with Ivan the Terrible and Godunov loved those damn coins. But British tried few times to eatablish network of posts in unclaimed land, but failed. British were then like "I didn't want your stupid furrs and woods anyway" salty and started looking west toward Amerca. France had same as Britain without pesky Russians and those Spanish and Portugese colonies looked dope as hell. Rest is as they say is history.
Fun fact: trade with Russia was training ground for future British East India Company.
It still wants.The most recent attempt was made in the 90s, but Putin stopped it. They viscerally hate him for this.
Well done! So much profound research in a highly entertaining format 🏆
Here's two fun facts HM ommitted here:
1: 3:26 Yes, as the attentive among you might have noticed, Leopold I was of the same royal family as that which would eventually come to the throne and still reigns in the UK. Similarly to how the house of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha switched their name to the house of Windsor, the belgian house switched its name to the much less original "House of Belgium" at the same time and for the same reasons. To this day, the royals of both the UK and Belgium technically belong to this same royal house.
2: 3:14 The first-choice monarch for Greece was actually Leopold I, who would soon go on to take the throne of Belgium instead. HM clearly was aware of this since he used the same character model in both animations, dunno why he didn't say it haha ^^ consider this an easter egg
The Bulgarian royal family is also from Saxe-Coburg Gotha. Our last Tsar, Simeon II (who was even PM from '01-'05) is a distant cousin of Elizabeth II.
Leopold was actually married to Charlotte, the only child of George IV, and was set to become Prince Consort. But she died in childbirth and, well, there went those plans. He did, however, recommend his sister to his deceased wife's uncle Edward, Duke of Kent, who became the parents of Queen Victoria. He then played a role later in getting his nephew Albert and Queen Victoria together....
Saxe-Coburg-Gotha no longer reign in UK. That dynasty literally ended with Elizabeth II. Charles, while her son, is actually agnatically of his father's dynasty - the Glucksburg dynasty which is a cadet of Danish Oldenburg dynasty. This same dynasty ruled also (besides Denmark and Norway) in Russia and Greece. The fact Charles kept officially the name Windsor is besides the point.
@@joekerr9197the house of Belgium will lose control of Belgium with in two years when the heir to throne dies or resign for her heir
3:59 - Fun fact, Bulgaria's first replacement choice was prince Valdemar of Denmark, also from a German family, namely the house of Glücksburg
As I understand it, a lot of the 'marrying off' to other royal houses happened because many dynastic laws said people in line for the throne (of wherever) had to marry houses of equal status. There were so many German states with houses of equal status to other monarchies. If someone in line didn't marry properly, it was considered a morganatic marriage and basically dropped all descendants of the line from any succession rights
Ah yes, the mistake of dying without an heir: the fatal mistake of historical monarchs
Easy to do when lots of illnesses that you can survive but end up causing medical issues later like low sperm count. Then you have the very high maternal and infant mortality rates. Both were 10% in the UK and US in 1900 god knows how bad both were in the 18th century or earlier.
And people think this is a modern thing.
If a King can't even field an heir with their bountiful loins how a mf like me supposed to smh my head
Royalist: "Monarchy is great because there's no conflict over succession, so..."
Monarch: dies without an heir.
Royalist: "COME ON, YOU HAD ONE JOB!"
@@Mnnvint That argument is always the dumbest shit, mf gets no hoes and the country goes into civil war lmfao
It is so funny that when the queen had her 70th anniversary this year we had a monarchy expert in German national television who constantly reminded us how proud we Germans could be as well because the queen is technically a German queen too making it "our queen" haha
70th not 75th
@@pedanticradiator1491 yes you're right my bad sorry
Stupid journalists for stupid people. Every educated german knows about the british royals being of german blood. On the other hand recent powers take an immense effort in teaching people to disrespect our own nobility. But times may change..
The simplicity of your presentation is quite refreshing.
This was like the cliff notes presented through a fire hose and animated for simplicity....awkwardly satisfying, bravo to the production team and narrator, 🤛🏻👊🏻🤜🏻
For sure this same team should produce a slightly slower paced yet more in depth series....💪🏼🧠✊🏼✌️
1:16 James the Second
me: What??? the channel finally officially reviewed the history of James Bissonette?
CORRECTION
2:00: The house of Oldenburg does actually no longer reign in Denmark today.
Christian VII. (who was the last absolute monarch) died childless, so prince Christian Frederik from the house of Glücksburg was picked as the new king (Christian IX.) and it is the house of Glücksburg, who still reigns to this day in Denmark.
(I'm not keen on Norwegian history, so I don't know about them).
the House of Glucksburg is part of the House of Oldenburg. The present Norwegian monarchy started around 1905 with the first king being a Danish Prince
@@pedanticradiator1491 I wasn't aware of that. Thank you for the information.
The house of Oldenburg is also where the Romanovs and the old Greek royal family came from. (Bavarian royal only stuck a few years and they plucked a Danish one after)
2:52 As a german, I did not expect such a sign in an english video and it caught me off guard lmao
What dada it mean
@@DonutsIceCreamAndCottenCandy We are also Russian
I am amazed, too. It shows we have all come a long way and are finally able to discuss the true historical facts for the records.
The habsburgs actually ruled over Spain as well at one point before the War of the Spanish Succession began
After all of the "and they died childless", I see now that the short version of why there are so many German monarchs is that they are really really good at having kids. Because, you know, German is the language of romance.
Friendship ended with French, now German is my best friend.
Oh ja, die ganze Faust, ja!
according to Mark twain it actually is the language of love and affection and it is impossible to be angry in German since the language lacks impulsive agressive words. he had the opinion that German language should import English words so it is finally possible to be angry in that language.
"I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse." - Charles V.
Something I'll always remember from the medieval II total war loading screens
Ah no. Most of those that died childless did so because any children they did have died, often at birth. It seems weird but during this period, pandemics apart, the rich often lost more children than the average people. This was because, in those days, doctors were more dangerous to your health than *not* having doctors.
Cuza, the "despotic" Romanian leader, was so "despotic" that the guys who made him leave are now known in Romanian history as "The monstrous coalition"
I like these videos, they bring awareness to not often talked about and interesting subjects
Regarding Queen Anne's cousin, Sophia was James 1's granddaughter and she was married to a German noble.
She was Anne's heir, but she died before Anne did.
Indeed, Sophia is the ancestor you have to have for a claim to the British throne.
I love the idea that some long lasting ruling dynasties in European countries came to be because "another nation chose our King back in the day and his descendants still rule"
I will never understand why Europeans (and some other nations) were so inclined to install a monarch or ruler of “royal breed”, even a foreign one, before a local. That’s like the dumbest thing I can think of.
@@davidcervantes9336 there are several reasons. Mainly because when you're choosing a local house over a foreign one,it creates a sort of resentment by the other houses coz it could've been them instead of them. A foreigner to rule over you would create less of that. And since it's a foreigner they won't know much about the land and it's customs. So you could take advantage of that to secure more power and privileges for yourself. Also a foreign dynasty helps because it's most prolly a junior son of the ruling family of a foreign country. So obviously they'll have some intrests in keeping up the house in the new country which in turn would make sure they won't be eaten up by another country.
@@davidcervantes9336 One of the biggest reasons for choosing a foreigner is compromise. Sure, during the American War of Independence George Washington quickly established himself as the talented, accomplished and universally admired leader of the revolution, but most newly-independent countries didn't have a George Washington, but rather many different leaders, each representing different factions of society and many of them rivals, all with different visions of what the country should be. In that kind of climate, a foreign noble will make for a much more universally popular monarch than any given local leader. This was especially the case in countries with major cultural divides, for example in Belgium, a country split between a Dutch-speaking North and French-Speaking south, putting a German bloke on the throne was a pretty good compromise.
The other major reason, as mentioned in the video, was diplomatic. Going back to Belgium, Leopold I was married to the British King's niece, and following her death his second marriage was to the King of France's daughter. These connections ensured good relations between the young nation and the Great Powers whose support it desperately needed, and guaranteed protection from any attempt at reconquest by the Dutch, as Britain and France now had a piece of their 'dynastic honour' invested in Belgian independence - some random Belgian dude wouldn't've had those valuable connections.
TL;DR: Both in terms of internal stability and external diplomacy, making a foreign royal your monarch was a very shrewd decision for many newly-independent countries in 19th century Europe.
@@davidcervantes9336 depends, the thing that saved Romania was installing a Hohenzollern on the throne
@@spaghettification8658 Interesting, as a Yank I've had a hard time figuring out the reasons of monarchies, you and the comment above you explained it pretty clear and I have a better understanding now, once again the comment section on this channel is as good as the video. I do find Cromwell an interesting figure in history, had he lived longer or if his son would of been stronger would there of been a house of Cromwell? I always found it strange they brought back King Charles son but I can see it was for the stability.
The House of Saxe Coburg and Gotha has now been succeeded by a junior branch of the House of Oldenburg, namely the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg / Mountbatton-Windsor
fun fact: Simeon Borisov von Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the czar of Bulgaria, is the only man in history who was czar of a country and also a democratically elected prime minister of it 45 years later. He is still alive btw.
Basically he used to be both the head of state and the head of government in a country where both positions are held by separate people? (IDK, my country has both positions held by the same person)
@@riziq30 he wasn't both at the same time. He was czar during the second world war, when he was a child. Therefor he didnt make any decisions More then 50 years after that he became the prime minister by a democratic election.
Kind of crazy to think that a real monarch becomes prime minister so much later.
@@Osterochse yea that's what I think
Napoleon III was a democratically elected president.
Norodom Sihanouk was also King (on two separate occasions, 1941-1955 & 1993-2012) of Cambodia, as well as Prime Minister of Cambodia from 1955-1960, after he abdicated in favour of his father (Cambodia is a semi-elective monarchy) in order to enter politics and get elected Prime Minister.
He was also simply 'Head of State' of Cambodia without the title of King from 1960-1970), 'Chairman of the Presidium' (figurehead head of state) of the Communist Democratic Kampuchea regime in Cambodia from 1975-1976, President of a government in exile of Democratic Kampuchea from 1979-1989 (which had international recognition, including retaining Cambodia's seat at the UN), and head of a provisional government from 1989 to 1993.
Short answer: Because there were many German royal families (HRE and stuff).
Even shorter answer: Because.
@@vomm A bit too short.
As someone from Schleswig-Holstein I have to say that I like our people ruling basically everyone else.
1. Es war das Haus Oldenburg, besonders mit ihrer Seitenlinie Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg
2. Lediglich die Dänen, das Hause Oldenburg selber und die Norweger vertreten diese Linie. Bei Griechenland ist es nur teilweise vertreten. Man könnte natürlich noch Holstein-Bottrop dazu zählen und hätte damit auch die Russland dazu
Die restlichen Monarchen stammten aber aus den Häusern Hohenzollern(-Sigmaringen) (wie Rumänien und Bulgarien) ab, Sachsen-Coburg-Gotha (Großbritannien, Belgien, (teilweise Griechenland und Russland)) und die Häuser Braunschweig, Hannover und Bayern ab.
Ich auch. Hasse die siehst arroganz. Genug
I asked this same question in my history class to professor and he replied me back like this: "Small german states were not powerful as other great powers in that time in europe therefore selecting one of german prince was not harmful at all to the interior policies." same as in the video.
Also US didn't choose a king because all of the people in the administration were basically bourgeoise. And for them, the idea of a king was not popular + if someone would be a king it must be chosen from one of them which can quickly end up as civil war.
That is probably the main reason.
Also the idea of a monarchy sounds quite incoherent with the whole "all men are equal" thing
Did I miss the part about Albania’s German Monarch?
Prince Wilhelm of Wied
Albania was only very briefly ruled by a German. After gaining independence in late 1912, the Congress of Trieste appointed Wilhelm of Wied, but his rule was interrupted after Albania was occupied in WW1. Albania had many regencies before being declared a republic in 1924. Then in 1928, President Ahmed Bey Zogu declared himself King Zog I. Zog was the last recognized monarch of Albania with Victor Emmanuel of Italy claiming the throne of Albania after making them a protectorate in 1939.
@@DedicatedCaffeineUser King Zog sounds like some villain in a superhero comic book.
another brilliant and interesting clip - my only request is that the channel keep going with the English history video's thru the George 11 and onwards period. I consider your apolitical and objective presentation gives people the opportunity to learn new material and make our own decisions on what it all means. Once again - great work.
As a Belgian, I love how you translated “L’union fait la force” as “Stroopwafels zijn heerlijk” in the background 😂. Nice touch - should be our real national motto!
It means ‘treacle waffles are delicious’. As a Dutch person I had to smile too, but I don’t get the joke to be honest…. 😳
But it doesn't really work because stroopwafels are very much a Dutch and not a Belgian thing, even though Dutch is one of the offical languages in Belgium.
@@uytteb indeed. Stroopwafels are the kind of thing I would bring back to relatives in Belgium if I’ve been to the Netherlands. That, and some old cheese.
😂
As a German I read “Stroopwafels zijn heerlijk” as "Waffeln sind herrlich". Well, now that I know actually "Sirupwaffeln", but who cares.
@Morer R The official Belgian motto means "unity makes us powerful" or "eendracht maakt macht" in Dutch. Stroopwafels are indeed very Dutch, should have chosen something more Belgian, like chocolate, beer or small firearms.
The part about Greece is flawed to say the least. The current royal lineage (which is royal in name only) is not descended from Otto of Bavaria. King George I became king seeing as the Great Powers didn't want Prince Albert of England to be named king. George I was a danish prince, and reigned from 1863 to 1913. He was assassinated and his son, Constantin I, took the throne. After "quite a messy time" of revolution in Greece, the monarchy was finally abolished in 1973.
Constantine II styles himself "King of Greece" and his wife Queen Anne-Marie (sister of currently Danish Queen Margrethe II)
Otto of Bavaria ruled Greece for 30 years but was overthrown and a new family was installed instead.
Awesome video, so densely packed with information. The Animation was, as always, really entertaining.
The Netherlands was/is also "ruled" by a German royal family. The Orange-Nassau family has German roots and (apart from William II) predominantly married German. It was the Nassau-Weilburg family (German princes and cousins of the Orange-Nassaus) that inherited the duchy of Luxembourg after Wilhelmina succeeded her father William III (Salic law) which showcases the remaining German ties.
Also both Denmark en Norway are ruled by the house of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg- Glücksburg. As will the UK be! Prince Philip took the name Mountbatten similarly to what the Windsor's did, but is actually a Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg. When Charles succeeds he could still take his father's name.
Finally, stroopwafels are Dutch, not Belgian ;)
Actually, the British royal house has already decided that even if Charles ascends to the throne, he'll still keep the name Windsor. To quote Prince Philip:
"I am nothing but a bloody amoeba. I am the only man in the country not allowed to give his name to his own children."
@@angusyang5917 That's interesting! I thought that, as monarch, he reserved the right to change his name (regnal and last, for that matter) once he ascends to the throne, but it could well be that it has already been decided.
Dutch ~= Deutsch. The Dutch are descendants of Roman-era germanic tribes (Batavia) who never got the memo to join up and become part of the German Nation. So anyway, the idea that their monarchy comes from Germany seems natural. They're basically in denial about being the same people. The Dutch are basically just water-Germans. ⛵ Like Kevin Reynolds from Waterworld (1995).
@@matthewexline6589 I'm not too sure I agree with that. The Dutch now are predominantly descendents of the Frisian and Salic Frank peoples, as the Batavians moved south during the migration period after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. According to that reasoning the French and English would also be "Germans" as they are descendents from the Franks and Anglo-Saxon tribes, which I don't think is true. I think the political division between Germany and the Netherlands happened during the Dutch Revolt and the Peace of Münster (1648) when the Emperor recognised Dutch sovereignty and allowed them to leave the HRE. Strong ties remained, though, as many German workers migrated to the Netherlands and the Princes of Orange and Kings of the Netherlands predominantly married German.
@@pepijnvanaken4855 I'm not too sure I agree with it either, was mostly commenting for the sake of commenting.
The Bulgarian ruler mentioned here as 'a nephew of the Russian tzar' was Alexander of Battenberg, also of German stock. And he wasn't deposed because he was 'terrible' but because he opposed Russian influence in Bulgaria and was at odds with his cousin, the new Russian tzar (Alexander of Battenberg was deposed by a group of officers who were promised ranks in the Russian army with increased salary, returned to Bulgaria and then resigned due to pressure by the Great Powers - including Russia, Germany and Austria). Admittedly, he also had autocratic tendencies but remains fondly remembered by Bulgarian people for his role in the Unification of Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia, his love for his adopted homeland and his express wish to be buried in the country. In popular history he remains a universally celebrated figure, while historians have a more balanced opinion of him.
And the last Tsar of Bulgaria (who was only 6 years old when he was crowned) became Bulgaria’s Prime Minister 55 years after he was overthrown!
Great video. Loved how it was easy to follow but also snappy into the point.
There is quite a big mistake in the bulgarian part of the video.
Our first King wasn't actually a king but a Knyaz(title similar to king) and he was overthrown by a russian coup in the country. After the coup was defeated, he actually refused to come back, because it would anger the Russian empire and possibly endanger Bulgaria.
He was actually a great ruler and cared deeply for Bulgaria is buried here.
The following ruler Ferdinand of Austria wasn't our first choice and was actually the first one to agree to become Knyaz of Bulgaria, there were several other candidates that refused to become rulers.
Knjaz translates to prince so bulgaria at that time would be considered a principality
Ferdinand was horrible
@@reljamirovic146 it remained so until 1908
Italy was also ruled by the German Royal family. "House of Savoys" was also from German origin.
do you have a source for me?
House stark was also ruled by a german family
The origins of the family aren’t clear. There is no clear source for the origin of the founder Humbert of Savoy.
The dinasty was quite small and insignificant for it’s first few hundreds years as counts, thus little sources exist for their early history.
Thus we do not what family the Savoy’s originated from (or weathed Humbert was a noble at all, though there is a legend that he was related to Emperor Otto I, which almost certainly false).
Generally the “nationality” of houses are determined in two ways:
Either by it’s place of birth. In this case this can be seen as either Italy (since Savoy was Italy at the time), Switzerland (since Humbert was also count of Valais) or France (since that is were Savoy is today).
Otherwise it can also be given based on whom granted the title: in this case it was granted by a Burgandy, does it may be seen as a house of Burgandy (thus French).
I called them Franco-Italian, since Savoy is on the border between France and Italy, I don't think they were really German.
Isn't savoy in southern France, on the Italian border?
I love that you used the old pre-1918 Borders of Belgium in your tumbnail. It’s in de details…
"The Queen is german, but we don't always sing deutschland deutschland über alles everytime she comes on the television."
love your work
Amazing video! The amount of information that you packed in such a small video is truly something amazing... After finishing the video I thought I was watching it for at least ten mins!
Also the weird situation where several of WWI's leaders (including ones on opposite sides) all had ties to Queen Victoria, so a bunch of cousins who were friends fought each other's countries.
3:08 Major mistake/gap here. You mentioned only the first Royal House of Wittelsbach that held the Hellenic Crown in the beginning, until the same house that you mentioned in Denmark had one of its Princes, William of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, ascend to the Hellenic Throne as George I, hence keeping the "German" albeit Danish Royal family in there.
You could have mentioned his son Constantine I marrying the sister of the Kaiser and his grandson Paul marrying Frederica of Hanover, tying it more to more dynasties than that.
schleswig-holstein-sonderburg-glücksburg? that's hilarious! :'D
🧠....🤯....🤤
When most people think of German dynasties, they almost exclusively think of the male-line descent, they don't care about all of the various nuances of political marriages.
@@Ass_of_Amalek it dilutes into a geographical location:
Schleswig-Holstein, the Duchy. Sonderburg the county. Glücksburg the Castle.
@@alexhousakos sonderburg (~special castle) and glücksburg (luck castle/happiness castle) are both very funny.
I'm currently researching the history of our local prince.
It was the home of the Nassau-Oraniner in Siegen, Dillenburg and Wiesbaden.
Prince Wilhelm of Nassau-Orange, born in Dillenburg, rallied soldiers and united with the Dutch against the Habsburg-Spanish. He later went down in Dutch history as William 1st King of Orange.
His son exchanged Nassau-Siegen for the Duchy of Luxembourg on the occasion of the Vienna Congress in 1815. That was after Napoleon's last defeat.
The princes of Luxembourg-Nassau rule to this day.
Siegen was annexed to Prussian Westphalia, which is why it now belongs to North Rhine-Westphalia. But the other areas (Nassau-) Dillenburg to Wiesbaden were added to Hessen.
Orange (Oranier, Oranje) was originally a French title of nobility, where the family had also taken over land.
That's why the Dutch always wear orange at football matches.
Great insight, thanks!
You are confusing William the Silent (Dillenburg 1533) with William I of the Netherlands (The Hague 1772), and that gap between becoming the Duch Head honcho and becoming the king explains the non-inclusion in this, it was a Prince (French title) who became the head of a Republic, and that family at the head of a republic became king, but much, much later.
I found it quite interesting that the British _and_ Russian royal families both had some Germanic roots, but I found this quite an informative look into much smaller dynasties, like Denmark, Romania, and Bulgaria! In short, it's mostly about marriages, and partially about Romania and Bulgaria getting an ally from Germany! Thanks for the video!
Edit: replaced "German" with "Germanic" to distinguish the country "Germany" from Germanic ethnic groups.
But they don't, this is a fundamental misunderstanding of how Royalty works. In the case of the British the current Royal Family are still descendants of Alfred the Great, so was William the Conqueror and literally every other person who wasn't born in England who ruled it after him with the ONE exception of Cromwell who was never King but a Republican Dictator. Royal Families exist outside the concept of a race of ethnicity, all of them are related to each other etc. etc. If you apply a modern lens of race and nationality to it you miss literally everything because these systems predate our entire modern concept of Nationality, Ethnicity, and Race.
They don't have "German roots" but Germanic roots, there's a big difference here! Being German has to do with being from Germany, being Germanic however has nothing to do with being from Germany or being German, but rather with speaking the language german and being from a german speaking region.
Das wissen wir als deutsche...
We had the Austrian...
God I wished he would have painted
@@jorgejustin461 Good points! This would explain all the complications of royal families, which, as you said, exist outside of nationality and ethnicity! For example, most people would consider the House of Windsor to be a _British_ royal family, even with the occasional foreign blood inside of it! The important thing isn't being ethnically "British" (since Great Britain had kings long before nationality, ethnicity, or race became the concepts they are today), but merely _ruling_ Great Britain. Thanks for the correction!
@@Nightmare-fq1vv Good point! Whereas "German" usually refers to the country of Germany (which didn't even exist as a unified entity when some of these dynasties, like the British royal family or the Russian imperial one, got their Germanic roots), _GermanIC_ refers to the ethnicity: places beyond the borders of Germany, like Austria, Liechtenstein, and the German-speaking parts of Switzerland. Thanks for the correction! I updated my original comment!
Some royal: _dies childless_
germans: "It's free real estate"
For those who do not know, Windor may still be the name of the Royal house of the UK, but Charles III is a direct male line descendent of the house of Oldenberg, just as the Rusian Tsars were from Peter III onward.
Feel like James Bissounette had a hand in choosing monarchs
The Romanian Hohenzollerns were from Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen (a Catholic branch of the House of Hohenzollern), while the Prussian branch was Protestant
Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, being part of the Ernestine line of House Wettin, might be the most successful exporter of Royalty in the 19th century. For about 1000 years being some regional margraves and dukes, with their height in power during the Lutheran Reformation, the Ernestine line lost the Archdukedom to the other Wettin line, the Albertians, and later split in smaller, and smaller dukedoms. But with the surge of the National state in the 19th century after the Napoleonic Wars, many newly formed states noted a grave lack of homegrown royalty. Being oppressed for centuries does not bode well for your own lineages of princes and kings, and thus, they had to look elsewhere.
To be fair to Anne it's not like she didn't try, she was pregnant 17 times, 14 were miscarriages/stillbirths, two didn't make it past a year and the last one died at age 11
She surely was the Most tragic English Queen who suffered the most both as woman as well as Queen who desperately needed an heir….imagine her unhappiness for so many years…!
At 0:06. The Brits and Belgians were ruled by the Saxe-Coburg-Gothas. The Germans by the Hohenzollerns. The Austro-Hungarians by the Hapbsburgs. The Russians by the Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorps (though they pretended to be Romanov). The Danes, Norwegians and Greeks by the Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburgs. I don't know the rest. But I do know that Luxembourg was ruled not by a German family, but by a French one--the Bourbon-Parmas. The ruling house of Luxembourg pretends to be German, just like the ruling house of Russia pretended to be Russian or the ruling house of the UK pretends to be British.
0:20 - Not all of French-speaking Europe was unified, just most of it. Some francophones lived (and still do) in Belgium, Luxembourg, Monaco and Switzerland.
I wish someone would do a series on the constituent counties of the German empire
Fun fact about the renaming of the UK Royal Family. It was done in 1917 specifically because the Germans began using a large, twin engined biplane bomber called the “Gotha” bomber.
They were already under pressure to sound less Germanic but having an enemy bomber (who’s first raid hit a school and killed dozens of children) was really awful optics so boom. Renamed Windsor after their castle and the Royal borough in Berkshire. A place with a thousand years of English-British Royal history going back to William I.
A similar course was undertaken by Prince Albert, who, due to increasing tensions with Germany in the 30s would rule as George VI, taking on the name of his very popular Father George V. Who also navigated Britain and her empire through the hardships of WW1 and the great depression. We saw us through WW2 and was the last British monarch to hold the title of Emperor of India.
George VI was more a case of not wanting to use the name of his great-grandfather, IIRC.
@@silenthunteruk Not sounding German right as Germany is invading everyone is also a shout
St: George is our patron saint too so its very English
@@maxkennedy8075 He took over in late 1936. Germany hadn't done *much* invading then.
@@silenthunteruk Only a spoonful of invading
Die Engländer sind Deutsche! Das würden wir auch sagen, wenn Wilhelm 1066 die Schlacht von Hastings verloren hätte.
Thanks a lot for this easy to understand summery.
Thanks for entertaining/teaching us about history, very informative, i know that theres so much german families but i didnt know the details
and for showing the intrinsic instability, and therefore stupidity, of having a monarchy.
work shy bums the lot of them.
Me as a romanian,i have to say that this is one of the worst thing we had to do,the romanian rulers , Alexandru Ioan Cuza was an amazing guy,he did so many things in such a short time,was kicked out because he wanted some changes for the better of the people that would hurt the rich,he did make some of them true
Also the german guy,he was not the first choice,first was a french guy (don't remember the name) but he refused.
Even so,our german kind was amazingly fit for the job,so much things were done thanks to him but some reform that the original king started were put on hold until his successor.
Was the Fench guy not Belgian if I’m mistaken? I’m referring to prince Philip, count of Flanders .
@@bjarniyt1402 yes you are right, Philip something he was the son of Leopold of Belgium
@@ciprianmogosanu7169 A Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, like Queen Maria.
Lol...the "French guy" was also German...
@@joekerr9197 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Nice video.
“James the second,” I guess we now know where bissonette got his wealth and title status from
The US considered having a German (Prussian) monarch very briefly when we floated the idea of monarchy after getting independence. The logic being, a Prussian Prince would make the US more legitimate than crowning Washington.
After the revolution, the only person the American people liked more than Washington was God, and even that’s debatable. You must mean international legitimacy, because internally everyone was more than fine with Washington ruling, whether it be as president or king.
@@DovahFett Of course I meant international legitimacy. European monarchs would not have seen Washington as an equal, even though he would have been the popular choice among the people. There was also the fact WAshington himself did not want to be a monarch, where as European nobility would have been much more open to it. The US went republican anyway though so in the end it didn't matter, but it's a fun bit of trivia.
Many of these German royal families were related because of queen Victoria. Her family was the Hanovers(descendant) from George I. She married prince Albert of the family that became Windsor. They then proceeded to I think 14 children who then married into nearly every royal family in Europe. Many of the children of these unions then married their cousins in other royal families. Most famous example Nicholas II and Alexandra of Russia who were first cousins. Also the family resemblance between Kaiser Wilhelm II, Nicholas II, and Edward VII is very weird. It's often hard to tell one from the other without captions.
And that was just with a few cousin marriages.
Now think of the Ptolemies and Cleopatras in Egypt, something like 4-5 generations of sister marrying brother ... that would likely be even more like clones ...
Honestly, the Eastern Roman / Greek system was far more rational and modern than the Holy Roman / Western system, based as it was on a strong centralized bureaucracy, centrally-controlled army and centrally-administered taxation. In West Europe it was only the remarkable Philip IV of France who managed to build a strong centralized state during the Middle Ages (he's the one who crushed the Knights Templar and made the Pope his servant). The vast lands of the Holy Roman Empire, from Marseille in the Mediterranean to Silesia in Poland, never managed that.
That’s also due to it being an Empire that basically started out of an alliance of different tribes/people. Therefor the HRE had the elector count system (Kurfürsten in German) which led to basically a federal state in which certain nobles almost had as much power as the emperor. Taking in new people after conquering their territories did not help with that problem. It was compatible to the Italians who also had state cities fighting for dominance with the exception that the HRE was a unifying system whilst Italian cities did not have one in place (many of which were also part of the HRE at some point)
Basically the HRE was a minority state and very heteromorph and accepting. It’s no wonder that it used to also have a very big Jewish population. The homogeneous teachings of Germany started probably only in the 16th century and gave rise to a national idea only in the 18/19th century. They peeked in WW2 as you might guess.
@@Schwachsinnn You make some good points, and I agree on some of them, such as the tolerance and federalism, which are also relevant in the context of the EU today. But after some point, the HRE was a clear anomaly that held Europe back. The Habsburg Emperor was nominally the most prestigious European monarch, but basically didn't care about the empire, only about his Austrian domains that could be actually controlled. The Germans and the Italians should be both thankful to Napoleon. Without him, I think neither of them would have achieved national unity. In these two countries you had, as late as 1800, things like theocratic republics or oligarchic city-states
@@giannb5145 You are saying that like existing as a myriad of countries, more like the Baltics, Balkan or Benelux would be worse than being the heirs Adolf & Benito's realms...
1:39 "when all things german suddenly became less popular" made me giggle for almost a minute. 😂😂😂
It's these subtle and intelligent jokes that require a little historical knowledge, that made me subscribe. Kepp up with the great work!
oh. . i get it now i was confused at first
At 3:13 the mentioning of Peter of Bragança it's a fun fact. He was by then Emperor Peter I of Brazil, King Peter IV of Portugal and missed to be Peter I of Greece. Certainly he would have a video of his own had him achieved this three crown feat.
Marrying German royalty was usually a good option because then you could get someone who:
1) Wasn't closely related to you
2) Didn't have significant de facto power of their own and was less likely to be able to overthrow you (although this wasn't a guarantee, Catherine the Great was able to overthrow Peter III even though her only connection to the Russian throne was her marriage to him)
Germans and Russians: Consistantly competing for the title of Best Boogie Man In Europe.
Ironically, Catherine managed to overthrow her husband by appearing more Russian than him to the Russian aristorcracy (Peter III was on board with making Russia to be more like Prussia, unlike Catherine)
Peter III was german himself