Saxe-Coburg and Gotha

**Saxe-Coburg and Gotha**

(Flag of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha)

(Ducal Coat of Arms)

Capitals Coburg and Gotha Head of State Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha Saxe-Coburg and Gotha or Saxe-Coburg-Gotha (German: Sachsen-Coburg und Gotha) served as the name of the two German duchies of Saxe-Coburg and Saxe-Gotha in Germany, in the present-day states of Bavaria and Thuringia, which were in personal union between 1826 and 1918.

The name Saxe-Coburg-Gotha may also refer to the family of the ruling House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha: this family played many and varied roles in 19th-century European dynastic and political history.

The Duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha

The two duchies of Saxe-Coburg and Saxe-Gotha were both among the Saxon duchies held by the Ernestine branch of the Wettin dynasty. The Duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha originated as the personal union of these two in 1826, following the death of the last Duke of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg without male heirs. His Wettin relations repartitioned his lands, and his son-in-law Duke Ernst I of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld received Gotha, and changed his title to Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, although the two duchies remained technically separate.

Ernst I died in 1844 and his elder son and successor, Ernst II, ruled until his death in 1893. As he died childless, the throne of the Duchy would have passed to the Prince of Wales, but he had already renounced the throne in favor of his next brother, Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh. Alfred's only son, also named Alfred, committed suicide in 1899, so when Alfred died in 1900, he was succeeded by his nephew the Duke of Albany, son of Queen Victoria's youngest son, who reigned as Duke Carl Eduard (Duke Arthur of Connaught and his son did not want to receive the Coburg-Gotha Duchy).

Carl Eduard reigned until November 18, 1918 when the Workers' and Soldiers' Council of Gotha deposed him during the German Revolution. The two Duchies, bereft of a common ruler, became separate states, but ceased to exist shortly thereafter, with Saxe-Coburg becoming a part of Bavaria, and Saxe-Gotha merging with other small states to form the new state of Thuringia in 1920 in the Weimar Republic.

The capitals of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha were Coburg and Gotha. The combined duchy had an area of 1,977 km² and a population of 242,000 (1905).

Saxe-Coburg-Gotha was the only European country to appoint a diplomatic consul to the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. The consul was named Ernst Raven, assigned to a position in the State of Texas. Raven applied to the Confederate Government for a diplomatic exequatur on July 30, 1861 and was accepted.^*

The House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha

The House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha was formerly the Royal House of several European monarchies, and branches currently reign in Belgium through the descendants of Léopold I, and in the United Kingdom and its associated Commonwealth realms through the descendants of Prince Albert. In the United Kingdom, King George V changed the name from Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to the House of Windsor in 1917. The House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha is a line of the Saxon House of Wettin.

Other members of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha came to rule in various other European countries. Ernst's younger brother Léopold became King of the Belgians in 1831, and his descendants continue to serve as Belgian Head of State. Ernst's nephew Ferdinand married Queen Maria II of Portugal, and his descendants continued to rule Portugal until that country became a republic in 1910.

Another scion of the family, also named Ferdinand, became Prince, and then Tsar, of Bulgaria, and his descendants continued to rule there until 1946. The current head of the House of Bulgaria, the former King Simeon II, goes by the name Simeon Sakskoburggotski and on 24 July 2001 became Bulgaria's Prime Minister. This marked the first occasion in history where a former monarch returned to a position of power via democratic election.

In 1826, a cadet branch of the house inherited the Hungarian princely estate of Kohary, and converted to Catholic creed. The Princes of Kohary were wealthy and are magnates of Hungary and Fuerst in the Austrian Empire. They managed to marry an imperial princess of Brazil, an archduchess of Austria, a royal princess of "the French", a royal princess of Belgium and a royal princess of Saxony.

Main branch of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha

Dukes of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, 1826 - 1918

Heads of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha since 1918

Other branches of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha

Kingdom of Belgium

=Name(s) of the Belgian Royal House

= Because of the First World War, King Albert I decided in 1920 to no longer use the name Saxe-Coburg and Gotha as the official family name of the Belgian royal family. The decision was done in silence and not enacted in an official royal decree. Therefore there is still some confusion in other countries and even in Belgium that Saxe-Coburg and Gotha still is the family name used by the Belgian royals. The family name was changed to van België, de Belgique and von Belgien. As Belgium is a country with three official languages, it was chosen to employ all three language versions as official family name with none having precedence over the other, probably making the Belgian royals the only family in the world with three different but equally valid family names. It is this family name which is used on the royals' identity cards and which they use in all official documents (marriage licenses, etc.)

On the accession of a member of the royal family to the Belgian throne, his/hers family name is officially changed to der Belgen - des Belges as to denote the fact that Belgium is a popular monarchy.

Kingdom of Portugal

Note: In Portugal the Royal House is usually not distinguished from the House of Braganza, and when so, it is known as House of Braganza-Wettin.

Tsardom of Bulgaria

Ferdinand (1887–1918)
Boris III (1918–1943)
Simeon II (1943–1946) — later Prime Minister of Bulgaria (Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha)

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (Northern Ireland from 1922)

Edward VII (1901–1910)
George V (1910–1936, after 1917 using the name Windsor).
Edward VIII (1936)
George VI (1936–1952)
Elizabeth II (1952–)

According to the official website of the British Monarchy, however, "the only British monarch of the House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha was King Edward VII, who reigned for nine years . . . . King George V replaced the German-sounding title with that of Windsor during the First World War. The name Saxe-Coburg-Gotha survived in other European monarchies, including the current Belgian Royal Family and the former monarchies of Portugal and Bulgaria."^*

= Name(s) of the British Royal House

Ernst I's younger son, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, became Prince Consort to Queen Victoria, Ernst's niece through his sister Viktoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. As a consequence of their marriage, Saxe-Coburg and Gotha became the Royal House name of the British Royal Family from the accession of Edward VII in 1901 until changed to Windsor by King George V in 1917 because a German name was deemed unpatriotic during World War I.

Contrary to common belief, Saxe-Coburg and Gotha was not the personal surname of either Prince Albert, his wife or their descendants. Neither Albert nor Victoria, in fact, knew their actual surname (royalty had no need of and never used such common labels) until in the late 19th century Queen Victoria launched an inquiry to identify her surname. After an exhaustive search her advisors concluded that Prince Albert (and thus the Queen — by virtue of her marriage) had the surname Wettin.

George V changed both Wettin and Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to Windsor in 1917. However, an Order-in-Council in 1960 again separated the Royal House name and the personal family surname of the monarch and her family. It decreed that while the Royal House name would remain Windsor, the descendants of Queen Elizabeth II and of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh would use the surname Mountbatten-Windsor. However, Prince Philip belongs to the house of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, and, technically, so will his descendants in the male line.

External links

The Catholic Encyclopedia: Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (article about the duchy, with details of religious issues, written in 1910).

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