HRH Princess Maud of Denmark
HRH Princess Maud of Wales
House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha
Marlborough House, London
Marlborough House, London
London
| Maud of Wales | |
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| Queen consort of Norway (more...) | |
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| Consort | 18 November 1905 - 20 November 1938 |
| Coronation | 22 June 1906 |
| Consort to | Haakon VII |
| Issue | |
| Olav V | |
| Full name | |
| Maud Charlotte Mary Victoria | |
| Titles and styles | |
| HM The Queen of Norway HRH Princess Maud of Denmark HRH Princess Maud of Wales |
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| Royal house | House of Oldenburg House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha |
| Father | Edward VII of the United Kingdom |
| Mother | Alexandra of Denmark |
| Born | 26 November 1869 Marlborough House, London |
| Baptised | 24 December 1869 Marlborough House, London |
| Died | 20 November 1938 (aged 68) London |
| Burial | Akershus Castle, Oslo |
Maud of Wales (Maud Charlotte Mary Victoria; 26 November 1869 – 20 November 1938) was Queen of Norway as spouse of King Haakon VII. She was a member of the British Royal Family as the youngest daughter of King Edward VII and Alexandra of Denmark. Queen Maud was the first queen consort of Norway since 1319 who was not also queen consort of Denmark or Sweden.
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She was born Princess Maud of Wales at Marlborough House, London as the daughter of Edward, Prince of Wales, who was the eldest son of Queen Victoria and at that time heir apparent to the British throne. Her mother was the Princess of Wales, Princess Alexandra of Denmark.
Princess Maud was christened at Marlborough House by John Jackson, Bishop of London, on 24 December 1869. Her godparents were Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany; the Landgrave of Hesse; Count Gleichen; the Duchess of Nassau; the King of Sweden and Norway; the Princess of Leiningen; Grand Duchess Marie Feodorovna; the Crown Princess of Denmark; and the Duchess of Inverness.
She was a high-spirited child, a quality that earned her the nickname Harry. Princess Maud of Wales took part in almost all the annual visits to the Princess of Wales's family in Denmark and later accompanied her mother and her sisters on cruises to Norway and the Mediterranean. She, along with her sisters Princess Victoria and Princess Louise, received the Imperial Order of the Crown of India from Queen Victoria on 6 August 1887. Like her sisters, Princess Maud also held the First Class of the Royal Order of Victoria and Albert and a Dame Grand Cross of the Order of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem.
On 22 July 1896, Princess Maud married her first cousin, Prince Carl of Denmark, in the private chapel at Buckingham Palace. Prince Carl was the second son of Crown Prince Frederick of Denmark, Queen Alexandra's elder brother, and Princess Louise of Sweden. The bride's father, the Prince of Wales, gave her Appleton House on the Sandringham Estate, as a country residence for her frequent visits to England. It was there that the couple's only child, Prince Alexander, was born on July 2, 1903.
Prince Carl was an officer in the Danish navy and he and his family lived mainly in Denmark until 1905. In June of that year, the Norwegian parliament, Storting, dissolved Norway's one hundred year-old union with Sweden and voted to offer the throne to Prince Carl. Following a plebiscite in November, Prince Carl accepted the Norwegian throne, taking the name of Haakon VII, while his young son took the name of Olav. King Haakon and Queen Maud were crowned at the Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim on June 22, 1906, the last coronation of a Scandinavian monarch.
Queen Maud never lost her love of Britain, but she quickly adapted to her new country and duties as a queen consort. She supported charitable causes, particularly those associated with children and animals, and gave encouragement to musicians and artists. She learned to ski and arranged for an English garden at Kongsseteren, the Royal lodge overlooking the nation's capital Oslo. Queen Maud's last public appearance in Britain was the coronation of her nephew, King George VI, in May 1937. She sat in the royal box at Westminster Abbey next to her sister-in-law Queen Mary and her niece the Princess Royal, Countess of Harewood.
Maud also acquired a reputation for dressing with fashionable chic. An exhibition of numerous items from her elegant wardrobe was held at the Victoria and Albert Museum in 2005.
Maud died of heart failure in London on November 20, 1938, six days before her 69th birthday (and the thirteenth anniversary of her mother's death), three days after an operation. Her body was returned to Norway on board the HMS Royal Oak, the flagship of Second Battle Squadron of the Royal Navy's Home Fleet. Queen Maud was buried in the royal mausoleum at the Castle of Akershus. At her death, Queen Maud was the last surviving child of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra.
Upon her marriage, Maud was granted the use of a personal coat of arms, being those of the kingdom, with an inescutcheon of the shield of Saxony, differenced with a label argent of five points, the outer pair and centre bearing hearts gules, the inner pair crosses gules[1]. The inescutcheon was dropped by royal warrant in 1917.
Queen Maud Land and Queen Maud Mountains in Antarctica, and Queen Maud Secondary School in Hong Kong are named after her. Queen Maud Gulf in Nunavut, Canada, is also named after her.
Maud's great-granddaughter, Princess Märtha Louise, named her eldest daughter after the queen.
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Maud of Wales
Cadet branch of the House of Wettin
Born: 26 November 1869 Died: 20 November 1938 |
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| Norwegian royalty | ||
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| Preceded by Sofia of Nassau |
Queen Consort of Norway 1905-1938 |
Succeeded by Sonja Haraldsen |
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