What does “morganic” mean? She’s King Arthur’s sister?
It’s morganatic. It means that the husband and wife have different status. Normally, a commoner who married a royal would become royal him/herself. In a morganatic marriage, this would not happen, and the commoner would remain a commoner.
IIRC, the marriage of the Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand(you know WWI, assasinated, all that) and his wife Sophie was morganatic. I remember reading that when their bodies lay in state on biers that his was slightly higher than hers becasue she wasn’t “rank” enough. Some people have starange ideas about status.
Absolutely !..oh, wait a minute. Marge or Wallis ?
If they’d just left the bodies lying in state long enough, they both would have been equally…
Nah, that pun’s too easy.
I knew there was more to it than that.
Now, a question about titling Camilla. Is there any good reason why she’d have to remain a commoner? Why does this have to be a morganatic marriage? Just curious.
Because she is divorced-so she would not be able to be made Queen of England. So she would have a lower rank than her husband.
And yes, it IS morganatic.
Some other famous morganatic marriages besides that of the Duke of Windsor and the Archduke Ferdinand include Grand Duke Mikhail of Russia, the last Tsar’s brother (who was actually Tsar for a day), who married a twice-divorced commoner. It wasn’t so much that she was divorced-as the Orthodox church DOES allow for divorce-but that she was a commoner. Several other Romanov cousins made morganatic marriages, including the Tsar’s uncle Grand Duke Paul Alexandrovich, his cousin Grand Duke Mikhail Mikhailovich, his sister Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna and quite a few others.
So being divorced and then marrying in to royalty prevents one from ascending to the throne? Have I got that straight? Camilla’s previous marriage is what will keep her from becoming queen?
Since I’m American and live in the USA, this doesn’t really affect me at all. I just think that all the stuff regarding how one gets titled is neat. 
About the morganatic stuff -
At the time that Edward, Prince of Wales was dating Mrs. Simpson, there was a lot of concern about this. George V ordered a study done, and was told that England, unlike the continental monarchies, has never recognised morganatic marriage. It’s all or nothing.
Ironically, after the abdication, George VI refused to grant the new Duchess of Windsor the title “Her Royal Highness,” to which she was entitled as the wife of a prince. In effect, George created the first morganatic marriage in English royal history. However, his decree had no legal status, was ignored by quite a few people, and is generally regarded as petty harrassment.
The upshot is, there is no legal precedent for morganatic marriage in England. Parliament would have to pass a law. It would have to read something like “Whereas, the wife of the king becomes queen, and whereas, the woman the king wishes to marry is totally unsuitable to be queen,…” You can see why Edward rejected this solution, and why Charles wouldn’t accept it either. And I have no idea what the House of Commons would have to say about it. The tabloids would have a field day.
As things stand now, if Charles and Camilla marry, and Charles becomes king, she would be queen.
One between a man of high (usually royal) rank and a woman of lower station, as a result of which she does not acquire the husband’s rank and neither she nor any children of the marriage are entitled to inherit the title or possessions.
Nothing new so far but:
A morganatic marriage is often called a ‘left-handed marriage’ because the custom is for the man to pledge his troth with his left hand instead of his right.
The word comes from the Med. Lat. phrase matrimonium ad morganaticam, the last word representing O.H. German morgangeba, the morning gift, from husband to wife after the consummation of the marriage, and the wife’s only claim to her husband’s possessions.
Source: Brewer’s Dictionary Of Phrase & Fable.
Actually casdave summed up my views quite well.
I can just about stomach that my taxes go to support a vast tribe of hereditary German-Greek thickos, who claim to lead the Country and the Church, whilst owning vast tracts of land.
But surely the only requirements for all this incredible luxury are:
- breed
- be faithful
- be respectable
Since the Queen Mother is a gambling addict, the Duke of Edinburgh is racist, the Queen’s sister is an alcoholic and the Prince of Wales committed adultery before, during and after his marriage, I don’t think I’m getting value for money. (In case you didn’t know, I would prefer a Republic.)
If a private citizen wants to remarry, it’s none of my business. If the heir to the throne (and to the Head of the Church) wants to marry his mistress, he can jolly well abdicate first.
Basically Charles has no guts or morals (and looking at Camilla, no taste either).
If as stated, the continued existence of Camilla’s former husband in this vale of tears is a problem, one might wonder why would a guy even want to be the Crown Prince, or Prince of Wales, or Heir Apparent, if you don’t have the power to see to it that the guy ceases to be a problem. There is a long disused custom on the sort of thing, see, for example, the Little Princes in the Tower. Revival of this fine old practice would surely liven up the soap opera.
I did just want to say one thing. Charles could, conceivably, have any woman he wanted. He married a woman universally described as beautiful, but who was a total flake. He didn’t love her. He seems to have loved, for many, many years, a woman who is not so beautiful. In other words, he has been attracted to her character and personality. I think it’s kind of sweet. (I also think double adultery is a major no-no, as is marrying someone you don’t love, but that’s another topic.)
While it may be rather sweet in the opinion of some that Charles & Camilla is rather sweet, it was very wrong of him to mary Diana as a brood mare (he should have married his horse-faced lady for that). Diana may have married someone else, had a very happy life, and not been harrassed to her death.
Can we please stop referring to Camilla as “horse face”?
I think that’s really immature-so she’s not a great beauty, so what?
The reason he couldn’t marry her is because in the first place, she had been known to have had a torrid love affair-and future kings had to marry virgins-at least, that’s what I have read.
BTW, her grandmother, Mrs. Alice Keppel, was the mistress of King Edward VII.
Indeed. However, he was pushed into it to a certain extent. He should have has the balls to say no. By the time that Diana was being pushed as a good virgin brood mare, Camilla had long been married to Mr Parker Bowles, so she was definitely “off the market”.
My last post was in reply to Spder Woman.
True. The whole situation was quite sad, and scrutinized quite publicly. At least most of us get to make our foolish mistakes with a certain degree of anonymity.
I reiterate that the main point why Charles and Horse-face (sorry Guin) are so reviled is that he is the Heir to the Throne and the future Head of the Church of England.
He simply doesn’t love her enough to give up all the money, power and pomp. So he’s greedy, hypocritical (and has big ears).
She’s committed adultery over decades with the Heir (even when they were both married), but now expects to be worshipped by the multitudes, given a State Wedding and a prominent position in society.
As soon as he abdicates, I’ll stop detesting them both.
Remember that these appalling people, and their relations, (who don’t have a proper job) cost us taxpayers millions of pounds every year.
I sort of agree. As I stated, double adultery (Charles and Camilla were both married) is wrong. Period.
My point was that constantly referring to Camilla as “horse-face” is rather catty. Her lack of conventional beauty is the only redeeming feature of the whole relationship.
As for Diana, my understanding (and I may be wrong) is that she was unstable, possibly suffering from borderline personality disorder. She was charming, but manipulative, totally self-absorbed and unable to keep a strong grip on reality. I doubt that she would have been happy, whoever she married. And, given her social class, background, and her brother-in-law the Queen’s private secretary, she should have had no illusions that she was being used for anything except breeding purposes. If she did, she was naive and foolish.
Guinastasia - The “rule” about marrying virgins is simply to be sure that any prospective heir is legitimate. Given the age of the parties involved, and the fact that Charles already has two legitimate heirs, it is pretty much irrelevant here.