Thread 12 is not completed yet, but the general direction is known, and I'll complete it soon enough. Thread 13 picks up the plot with the funeral of King Wilhelm I of Prussia in 1888
A Plethora of Princes (13) - The World Writ Large
1888
The funeral of King Wilhelm I in Berlin was like a glossary of who was who in European royalty. The ninety-one year old monarch had been elderly when he had taken the throne, in 1861, and his reign of twenty-seven years had been longer than anyone could have imagined. It had seen Prussia fight Denmark in the mid 1860s, acquire suzerainty over the newly-independent duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, and then annex them outright on the death of their first independent ruler at the start of the 1880s. Prussia's actions had in many ways caused the collapse of the German Confederation's political function. The Diet at Frankfurt was no more, and only the commercial and customs treaties remained in effect. The newly-acquired port of Kiel was in the midst of a massive development into a first class naval base, and the years of the 1880s had seen steady progress on the construction of the Kiel Canal, across the isthmus to the North Sea.
Among those attending the funeral were the three longest-reigning monarchs in Europe, King Louis I of Belgium who had ruled since that country had achieved its independence at the start of the 1830s, and King George V of Great Britain, and King Francis I of Ireland, both of whose thrones owed themselves to the settlement of the British Civil War in 1836.
Another to garner much attention was Emperor Rudolph of Austria, now apparently much recovered from his depression, and displaying by his side his young Empress, Luisa Antoinette, clearly heavily pregnant with their first child.
Tsar Aleksandr II of Russia cut an imposing figure, whilst a more exotic pose was struck by Prince Nicholas of Montenegro, whose retinue was paid for at the personal expense of the Tsar, rather ominously as some observers remarked.
The newest monarch, apart from Prussia's own King Frederick III, was King George II of Greece who had succeeded his father only the previous year. In his early thirties, and with a tiny retinue, all that his impoverished kingdom could afford, he cut a pathetic and lonely figure on the fringes of the event, and few noticed his early departure for his kinsman's estates in the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.
The youngest monarch, of course, was the adolescent King Charles XI of France, accompanying the Regent on a very rare journey outside of his kingdom.
With peace once again reigning in the world, it seemed as if the Old Order was signalling its re-establishment in full by the pomp and glamour of the occasion, respectful though it was to nonogenarian who had done much in his long reign to shape Prussia's modern course.
Grey Wolf
A Plethora of Princes (13) - The World Writ Large
1888
The funeral of King Wilhelm I in Berlin was like a glossary of who was who in European royalty. The ninety-one year old monarch had been elderly when he had taken the throne, in 1861, and his reign of twenty-seven years had been longer than anyone could have imagined. It had seen Prussia fight Denmark in the mid 1860s, acquire suzerainty over the newly-independent duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, and then annex them outright on the death of their first independent ruler at the start of the 1880s. Prussia's actions had in many ways caused the collapse of the German Confederation's political function. The Diet at Frankfurt was no more, and only the commercial and customs treaties remained in effect. The newly-acquired port of Kiel was in the midst of a massive development into a first class naval base, and the years of the 1880s had seen steady progress on the construction of the Kiel Canal, across the isthmus to the North Sea.
Among those attending the funeral were the three longest-reigning monarchs in Europe, King Louis I of Belgium who had ruled since that country had achieved its independence at the start of the 1830s, and King George V of Great Britain, and King Francis I of Ireland, both of whose thrones owed themselves to the settlement of the British Civil War in 1836.
Another to garner much attention was Emperor Rudolph of Austria, now apparently much recovered from his depression, and displaying by his side his young Empress, Luisa Antoinette, clearly heavily pregnant with their first child.
Tsar Aleksandr II of Russia cut an imposing figure, whilst a more exotic pose was struck by Prince Nicholas of Montenegro, whose retinue was paid for at the personal expense of the Tsar, rather ominously as some observers remarked.
The newest monarch, apart from Prussia's own King Frederick III, was King George II of Greece who had succeeded his father only the previous year. In his early thirties, and with a tiny retinue, all that his impoverished kingdom could afford, he cut a pathetic and lonely figure on the fringes of the event, and few noticed his early departure for his kinsman's estates in the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.
The youngest monarch, of course, was the adolescent King Charles XI of France, accompanying the Regent on a very rare journey outside of his kingdom.
With peace once again reigning in the world, it seemed as if the Old Order was signalling its re-establishment in full by the pomp and glamour of the occasion, respectful though it was to nonogenarian who had done much in his long reign to shape Prussia's modern course.
Grey Wolf
