What is the fundamental difference between the most popular monarchs of the family in the world: Japanese, English and Norwegian

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Surprisingly, it's not just actors, singers and writers who have fan clubs. The monarchical dynasties of the world have their own big fan-clubs, and each fan considers “his” dynasty to be the best. The three largest clubs are probably owned by the British, Norwegian and Japanese royal families. For those who hardly understand how these dynasties differ so fundamentally from each other - a memo from Cultural Studies.

Japanese imperial family name

- They take the motto of the board as their throne name. For the previous emperor, he was "Heisei", that is, "Establishment of Peace". The current emperor puzzled the whole world by choosing a word from old poems, whose exact meaning is unknown - "Reiva". According to the description given in official publications, its meaning is similar to … tolerance: members of society live in harmony, trying not to hurt or offend each other. Especially for this word, after the accession of the emperor, a sign for sign language was created. A seal lives in Tokyo, which was taught to write "Reiwa" in hieroglyphs.

- The current Empress Masako attended a Moscow kindergarten throughout her preschool childhood, and finished school in the United States. This is because her father is a prominent diplomat and he had to travel around the world.

“This dynasty (commonly referred to as Yamato) is the oldest in the world. She was never overthrown, although she was removed from power. The line of kinship stretches from the current emperor to, at least, the ruler of the sixth century, according to legend, the dynasty was even founded in the seventh century BC. By the way, many people still believe that the Japanese emperors descended from the goddess Amaterasu. And not only in Japan!

- For centuries, emperors and crown princes have married their cousins so as not to dilute the divine blood, but the last two emperors took “mere mortals” as their wives, if one can call such the daughter of one of the country's largest entrepreneurs and the daughter of the President of the International Court of Justice.

- The previous imperial couple were known in spheres far from politics. Emperor Heisei is a major marine biologist, and his wife made the Japanese children's poet Michio Mado famous in the big world by performing high-quality translations - after which Mado received the Andersen Prize. Emperor Meiji became famous for the fact that when his wife began to suffer from depression, he did not hide this fact and was ashamed of her, but became her faithful support, supported and protected her, giving an example of a new attitude towards people with this disease in Japan. By the way, the name of their only daughter, Aiko, is written in hieroglyphs that look like the phrase "love child".

- The Japanese imperial family still honors the old religious traditions associated with the Amaterasu cult. Empresses observe rituals that include growing rice in a special field and visiting imperial burials. By the way, they are often shown in public in kimonos, despite the fact that in general the style of their clothes is similar to that of the British royal family.

“The current emperor at Oxford had the nickname“electric”because he told his fellow students that in Japanese the words“Your Highness”sound a lot like“electricity”.

- According to custom, names in the imperial family are not invented by the child's parents, but by the reigning emperor. True, Princess Aiko was an exception.

- In Japan, a woman has long been no longer entitled to claim the throne, so Emperor Reiwa is succeeded by his nephew, Prince Hisahito, born in 2006, or the emperor's brother, Prince Fumihito, by the way, is a well-known ornithologist. - A large number of Japanese emperors left the throne through the abdication procedure, and not on the fact of death. The previous emperor, the father of the current one, did the same. But for the first time in two hundred years.

British royal family

- Officially, Queen Elizabeth II reigns not only over England, Scotland and Ireland, but also over Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Tuvalu, Jamaica and several other states. Moreover, these countries are considered completely independent. It's all about recognizing the tradition of the reign of the Queen of England. She is also recognized as the head of the Commonwealth of Nations from more than fifty countries.

- One of Queen Elizabeth's main income is betting on horse races. She is very good at this and can earn about half a million pounds a year on these rates alone. But the main source of her income is a percentage of profits from land and buildings owned by the crown. Or rather, run by the Crown Property organization. Income from real estate under her management is estimated at hundreds of millions of pounds.

- The British royal family is only slightly less obsessed with the Japanese tradition, which is very strictly observed. For example, boys of a family up to seven years old are dressed in shorts in any weather. True, this is a relative innovation - they replaced the old tradition of boys under seven to dress up in short dresses or kilts.

- The royal family has its own special language - many popular and completely neutral modern words, for example, for a restroom and a sofa, are strictly prohibited. Instead, they use the same words that were in use a hundred years ago.

“British monarchs have some very strange traditional privileges. For example, the Queen regnant owns all the swans of Britain, except for those that are allowed to be owned by three different organizations. Therefore, there is a special position in Britain, paid from the treasury: the people who occupy it must help the affected swans (in addition to other "swan" duties).

- Among other specific privileges of the British monarch are the right to his own court poet, the right not to be arrested and the right to drive without a license.

- As in Japan, the reigning monarch in Britain is a religious figure: he is the head of the Anglican Church.

Norwegian royal family

- The surname of the current dynasty is the Glucksburgs. Prince Philip, the husband of Queen Elizabeth II of England, belongs to the same dynasty. - Although in general all or almost all modern European monarchies behave democratically, the Norwegian dynasty is considered the most democratic of them … and, inevitably, the poorest.

- Norway is proud that its king refused to cooperate with the German occupiers and called on the Norwegians to resist the Nazis. At that moment and several days after (before the evacuation to Britain), he could easily be killed and even tried to do it. Fans of the Norwegian and British royal families often reproach fans of the Japanese dynasty for being Hitler's allies during World War II.

- As in the Japanese family, princesses can often be seen in national costumes. Unlike the Yamato dynasty, princes also wear national costumes from time to time, showing themselves to people during the holidays.

- The wife of the current king of Norway is the first woman of non-royal descent, taken as a wife by the monarchs of the current dynasty. She is also the first queen to visit Antarctica. Crown Prince Haakon is also married to a woman from a common family. They met at a music festival, and his chosen one, by the way, was a single mother. By the way, the next heiress after Haakon is their daughter Ingrid Alexandra.

“Ingrid Alexandra’s position in line to the throne is tantamount to that of Prince William.

- King Harald was the first Norwegian king to be born in Norway in more than five centuries. The fact is that representatives of the Danish dynasty ruled in Norway for a very long time and they were also born in Denmark. Nevertheless, Harald is a descendant of the Danish royal family, and not some new one.

- Unlike the Japanese dynasty, in the Norwegian since 1990, princesses are included in the line of succession to the crown. In Britain, however, this happened much earlier. In total, seven reigning queens sat on the English throne, and in Norway the reigning queen was last seen in the fourteenth century. But if Elizabeth II received the throne only because she had no brothers, then Ingrid Alexandra has a brother Sverre Magnus, and, nevertheless, she will receive the throne.

- The current dynasty is related to the previous Norwegian royal dynasty of the Bernadottes, founded by a companion of Napoleon and once an ardent opponent of the monarchy, Jean-Baptiste Jules Bernadotte, who took the throne name Carl Johan. On his body there was even a tattoo "Death to kings!"

Yet the focus of the Russian media is more often on one of these three dynasties: Harry's "riot", loving Andrew and other high-profile scandals in the British royal family.