Royal House
A
Royal House or
Dynasty is a sort of
family name used by
royalty. It generally represents the members of a family in various senior and junior or
cadet branches, who are loosely related but not necessarily of the same immediate kin.
Because of
royal intermarriage and the creation of cadet branches, a royal house generally will not entirely correspond to one family or place; members of the same house in different branches may rule entirely different countries and only be vaguely related. The family may have originated entirely elsewhere.
The House of
Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, for example, originated in
Germany as a
ducal and
electoral family. Today, it no longer holds any status in Germany, but different branches sit on various thrones, including those of the
United Kingdom and
Belgium. Former monarchs of
Portugal and
Bulgaria also belonged to this house, although they were not especially closely related, as they descended from different branches, some of them distinct for centuries.
Royal house names in
Europe are taken from the father; in cases where a
Queen regnant marries a prince of another house, their children (and therefore subsequent monarchs) belong to his house. Thus Britain's queen
Victoria belonged to the
House of Hanover, but her descendants by her consort prince
Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha became members of that house. (The name was changed to
Windsor in 1917.) This has been violated recently; the children of queens regnant in the
Netherlands and
Luxembourg have retained their maternal House association and in the United Kingdom,
Queen Elizabeth II's descendants by her husband, Prince
Philip of Greece and Denmark, will officially remain
Windsor, although they are technically of
Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg.
Another way in which the royal house of a given country may change is when a foreign prince is invited to fill a vacant throne or a next-of-kin from a foreign house succeeds. This occurred with the death of childless
Queen Anne of the
House of Stuart: she was succeeded by a prince of the
Hannover who was her nearest
Protestant relative.
The House of
Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg rules in Norway and ruled in Greece, because the modern founding monarchs of those nations were initially princes invited from
Denmark, which is a
cadet branch of that house.
Unlike all Europeans, most of the world's Royal Families do not really have family names and those that have adopted them rarely use them. They are referred to instead by their titles, often related to an area ruled or once ruled by that family. The name of a Royal House is not a surname; it just a convenient way of dynastic identification of individuals.
*
Bahrain:
House of Al Khalifa*
Belgium: House of
Wettin (Saxe-Coburg-Gotha line)
*
Bhutan:
House of Wangchuck*
Denmark:
Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (branch of the
House of Oldenburg)
*
Japan:
Imperial House of Japan*
Jordan:
Hashemite*
Liechtenstein: House of
Liechtenstein*
Luxembourg: House of
Nassau-Weilburg, (agnatically the
House of Bourbon)
*
Monaco: House of
Grimaldi (agnatically the House of Polignac)
*
Morocco:
Alaouite*
Netherlands:
House of Orange-Nassau (agnatically the House of Lippe)
*
Norway: House of
Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (branch of the House of Oldenburg)
*
Saudi Arabia:
House of Saud*
Spain:
House of Bourbon*
Sweden: House of
Bernadotte*
Thailand:
Chakri*
United Kingdom:
House of Windsor (agnatically the House of
Wettin, Saxe-Coburg-Gotha line)
The majority of these nations are now republics or part of republics. The Princely Houses of Germany often have given their own names to the states they ruled.
*
Afghanistan:
Barakzai and
Durrani dynasty*
Albania: House of
Zogu*
Anhalt-Dessau: House of Ascania
*
Anhalt-Köthen: House of Ascania
*
Anhalt-Zerbst: House of Ascania
*
Armenia:
Bagratid*
Austria: House of
Habsburg-Lorraine*
Baden: House of
Zähringen*
Bavaria: House of
Wittelsbach*
Brunswick: House of
Hanover (branch of the House of Guelph, a line of the House of
Este)
*
Bulgaria: House of
Wettin (Saxe-Coburg-Gotha branch)
*
Bohemia: House of
Habsburg-Lorraine*
Brazil: House of
Braganza; later
Orléans-Braganza (branch of the
House of Bourbon)
*
Busseto:
Pallavicino*
China:
Aisin Gioro 愛新覺羅 (
Qing Dynasty, Manchu Imperial Family);
Ming Dynasty;
Yuan Dynasty.
*
Egypt:
Muhammad Ali of Egypt The Great
*
Ethiopia:
Solomonic dynasty (
deposed 1974)
*
Ferrara,
Modena &
Reggio: House of
Este; later
Austria-Este (a branch of the House of
Habsburg-Lorraine)
*
France: House of Capet, branches including: House of
Valois (extinct 1589),
House of Bourbon (royal); House of
Bonaparte (imperial)
*
Georgia:
Bagratid*
German Empire: House of
Hohenzollern (Prussian line)
*
Greece:
Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (branch of the
House of Oldenburg)
*
Hesse and by Rhine: House of Lorraine-Brabant
*
Hawaii:
House of Kawananakoa*
Hungary: House of
Habsburg-Lorraine*
Iran (Persia):
Pahlavi*
Irak:
Hashemites
*
Israel:
Davidic line,
Beit Shalom and
Hasmonean Dynasty*
Italy:
House of Savoy*
Korea:
Yi*
Libya:
Senussi*
Lippe: House of
Lippe*
Maldives:
Huraa dynasty *
Mecklenburg-Schwerin: House of Mecklenburg
*
Mecklenburg-Strelitz: House of Mecklenburg
*
Mexico: Houses of
Iturbide and
Habsburg-Lorraine*
Mirandola:
Pico della Mirandola *
Monferatto :
House of Gonzaga*
Montenegro:
House of Petrović *
Naples and the
Two Sicilies:
House of Bourbon*
Oldenburg:
House of Oldenburg*
Ottoman Empire (Turkey):
Osmanli*
Palatinate of the Rhine: House of
Wittelsbach*
Parma Piacenza &
Guastalla:
Farnese; later the
House of Bourbon*
Portugal: House of
Braganza* Persia (
Iran):
Qajar Dynasty*
Reuss : House of reuss
*
Romania: House of
Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen*
Russia: House of
Holstein-Gottorp-Romanov (branch of the
House of Oldenburg)
*
Saxony: House of
Wettin**
Saxe-Altenburg (
Ernestine branch)
**
Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (Ernestine branch)
**
Saxe-Meiningen and Hildburghausen (Ernestine branch)
**
Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach (Grand Duchy of Saxony, Ernestine branch)
**
Saxony (Kingdom of Saxony, Albertine branch)
*
Schaumburg-Lippe: House of Lippe
*
Serbia and
Yugoslavia: Houses of
Karadjordjevic and
Obrenović*
Schleswig-Holstein: House of
Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Augustenburg (branch of the House of Oldenburg)
*
Sicily: House of
Hohenstauffen; later
House of Bourbon*
Tuscany:
Medici; later House of
Habsburg-Lorraine *
Vietnam:
Nguyễn Dynasty *
Waldeck-Pyrmont: House of Waldeck-Pyrmont
*
Wied: House of Wied
*
Württemberg: House of Württemberg
* Yawnghwe (
Myanmar):
Kanbawza
