This work contains an authorized biography of King Albert I, the son of Philip, Count of Flanders. Albert succeeded his uncle, Leopold II, on the throne, and served in the army and Senate. King Albert reaffirmed the neutrality of Belgian and refused to allow the German troops free passage through his country. He led the Belgian army in the retreat to Flanders, as well as leading the Belgian and French troops in the final Allied offensive. King Albert is known for introducing a new monetary system to Belgium and his reconstruction after the war. Illustrated.

Louis-Charles, Duc de Normandie, enjoyed a charmed early childhood in the gilded palace of Versailles. At the age of four, he became the dauphin, heir to the most powerful throne in Europe. Yet within five years he was to lose everything. Drawn into the horror of the French Revolution, his family was incarcerated and their fate thrust into the hands of the revolutionaries who wished to destroy the monarchy.

In 1793, when Marie Antoinette was beheaded at the guillotine, she left her adored eight-year-old son imprisoned in the Temple Tower. Far from inheriting a throne, the orphaned boy-king had to endure the hostility and abuse of a nation. Two years later, the revolutionary leaders declared Louis XVII dead. No grave was dug, no monument built to mark his passing.

Immediately, rumors spread that the prince had, in fact, escaped from prison and was still alive. Others believed that he had been murdered, his heart cut out and preserved as a relic. As with the tragedies of England's princes in the Tower and the Romanov archduchess Anastasia, countless "brothers" soon approached Louis-Charles's older sister, Marie-Therese, who survived the revolution. They claimed not only the dauphin's name, but also his inheritance. Several "princes" were plausible, but which, if any, was the real heir to the French throne?

The Lost King of France is a moving and dramatic tale that interweaves a pivotal moment in France's history with a compelling detective story that involves pretenders to the crown, royalist plots and palace intrigue, bizarre legal battles, and modern science. The quest for the truth continued into the twenty-first century, when, thanks to DNA testing, the strange odyssey of a stolen heart found within the royal tombs brought an exciting conclusion to the two-hundred-year-old mystery of the lost king of France.

Marie Thirise Louise de Savoie-Carignan, Princess de Lamballe, was fated to be not only an eye-witness but a victim of the Reign of Terror. She was born in Turin in 1749, was married in 1767 to Stanislaus, Prince of Lamballe and son of the Duke of Penthiivre, which brought her into the relationship of sister-in-law to the Duke of Orlians. Her husband died within a year, leaving her, as she expresses it, "a bride when an infant, a widow before I was a mother or had a prospect of becoming one." A marriage was proposed between the Princess and Louis XV, but it fell through. In her retirement she gained the friendship of Marie Antoinette, who appointed her superintendent of the royal household on the accession of Louis XVI. This official connection grew into a sisterly intimacy of the most cordial kind. Their youth of brilliant promise was soon overshadowed by ominous troubles. The lighter temperament of the Queen was happily balanced by the philosophic gravity of the Princess, who foresaw the bitter fruits of the conditions in which her royal mistress had been reared and would not radically change. This journal-record of experiences and reflections is as pathetic a tale as has ever been told.

For more than fifty years, Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor -- who became Elizabeth II, Queen of England on February 6, 1952 -- has been loved and loathed, revered and feared, applauded and criticized by her people. Still she endures as a captivating figure in the world's most durable symbol of political authority: the British monarchy.

In Monarch, a meticulously detailed portrait of Elizabeth II as both a human being and an institution, bestselling author Robert Lacey brings the queen to life as never before: as baby "Lilibet" learning to wave to a crowd in the Royal Mews; as a child "ardently praying for a brother" so as to avoid her fate; as a young woman falling in love with and marrying her cousin Philip; and as the mother-in-law of the most complicated royal of all, Princess Diana.

Updated with new material to reflect the 2002 Golden Jubilee and the passing of the Queen Mum -- and featuring dozens of photographs, a family tree of the Hanoverian-Windsor-Mountbatten families, and a map that charts the location of royal castles -- Monarch is an engaging, critical, and celebratory account of Elizabeth's half-century reign that no reader of popular history should be without.

Tsarina Alexandra-hauntingly beautiful, melancholy, obsessed with the occult-was blamed by her contemporaries for the downfall of the Romanovs. But her true nature has eluded previous biographers. Using archival material unavailable before the fall of the Soviet Union, acclaimed historian Carolly Erickson's masterful study brings to life the full dimensions of the Empress's singular psychology: her childhood bereavement, her long struggle to marry Nicholas, the anguish of her pathological shyness, and her increasing dependence on a series of occult mentors, the most notorious of whom was Rasputin. With meticulous care, Erickson has crafted an intimate and richly detailed portrait of an enigmatic historical figure. Unfolding against the turbulent backdrop of Russian history in the last decades before the Revolution of 1917, this engrossing biography draws the reader in to Alexandra's isolated, increasingly troubled interior world. In these pages, the tsarina ceases to be a remote historical figure and becomes a character who lives and breathes.

Intimate, rich in detail, carefully researched and informed by a generous imagination, Erickson's page-turning account of Alexandra and her times is a gem of biographical storytelling, as vivid and hard to put down as an enthralling novel.

"The best biography of Richard III that has been written."—A. L. Rowse, Chicago Tribune

Paul Murray Kendall's masterful account of the life of England's King Richard III has remained the standard biography of this controversial figure. 4 b/w illustrations.

"[A] definitive biography of Richard III. It is a noteworthy performance."—Geoffrey Bruun, Saturday Review

Edward the Elder succeeded his father Alfred the Great to the kingdom of Wessex, but was largely overlooked by his contemporaries (at least in terms of the historical record) and to a greater or lesser extent by later historians. He is the forgotten son of Alfred. Edward deserves to be recognised for his contribution to Anglo-Saxon history and a new assessment of his reign is overdue. He proved equal to the task of cementing and extending the advances made by his father, and paved the way for the eventual unification of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and the nation-state of England. The course of English medieval history after his death was a direct outcome of military successes during his reign. Edward was a ruthlessly efficient military strategist and commander, a strong and stable ruler and administrator, and the most powerful figure during the early decades of the tenth century. He and his famous sister AEthelflaed constructed fortresses to guard against Viking attacks and Edward conquered the southern Danelaw. He should be acknowledged as a great Anglo-Saxon king in his own right, and is entitled to stand comparison with every English monarch in the millennium that has passed since his reign.

Henry VIII's sisters, neglected by generations of historians, affected the lives of their contemporaries much more forcefully than did any of their brother's famous six wives. In The Sisters of Henry VIII, Maria Perry brings history alive by examining the lives of these extraordinary women and their influence on Europe in the Tudor Age. Margaret became queen of Scotland at age thirteen family members arranged beautiful Mary's betrothal to the aging king of France when she was twelve. But both women chose their second husbands for love: Margaret married and divorced twice after Henry's advancing armies slaughtered her first husband and kidnapped her children Mary risked execution by proposing to the handsome duke of Suffolk. ground-breaking in both depth and scope, Perry's work rescues two remarkable princesses from the shadows of history and offers a fresh interpretation of a royal family and an era sure to fascinate readers of Alison Weir and Antonia Fraser.

In 1804, when Josephine Bonaparte knelt before her husband, Napoleon, to receive the imperial diadem, few in the vast crowd of onlookers were aware of the dark secrets hidden behind the imperial façade. To her subjects, she appeared to vet hew most favored woman in France: alluring, wealthy, and with the devoted love of a remarkable husband who was the conqueror of Europe. In actuality, Josephine's life was far darker, for her celebrated allure was fading, her wealth was compromised by massive debt, and her marriage was corroded by infidelity and abuse.

Josephine's life story was as turbulent as the age—an era of revolution and social upheaval, of the guillotine, and of frenzied hedonism. With telling psychological depth and compelling literary grace, Carolly Erickson brings the complex, charming, ever-resilient Josephine to life in this memorable portrait, one that carries the reader along every twist and turn of the empress's often thorny path, from the sensual richness of her childhood in the tropics to her final lonely days at Malmaison.

Behind the Throne is, above all, a history of family life. They ate, entertained their friends and worried about money. Henry VIII kept tripping over his dogs. George II threw his son out of the house. James I had to cut back on the drink bills. The great difference is that royal families had more help with their lives than most. Charles I maintained a household of 2,000. Victoria's medical establishment alone consisted of thirty doctors, three dentists and a chiropodist. Even today, Elizabeth II keeps a full-time staff of 1,200. A royal household was a community, a vast machine. Everyone, from James I's Master of the Horse down to William IV's Assistant Table Decker, was there to smooth the sovereign's path through life while simultaneously confirming their status. Here, Adrian Tinniswood uncovers the reality of five centuries of life at the English court, taking you on a remarkable journey, exploring life as it was lived by clerks and courtiers and clowns and crowned heads. Behind the Throne is a true domestic history of the royal household, a reconstruction of life behind the throne. 'The most interesting and informative book on British royalty for many years' Literary Review

Here is the tragic, stormy life of Mary Tudor, daughter of Henry VII and Katherine of Aragon. Her story is a chronicle of courage and faith, betrayal and treachery—set amidst the splendor, pageantry, squalor, and intrigue of sixteenth-century Europe.

The history of Mary Tudor is an improbable blend of triumph, humiliation, heartbreak, and devotion—and Ms. Erickson recounts it all against the turbulent background of European politics, war, and religious strife of the mid-1500s. The result is a rare portrait of the times and of a woman elevated to unprecedented power in a world ruled and defined by men.

As Maureen Quilligan wrote in The New York Times Book Review of The First Elizabeth, Anne Boleyn "was a real victim of the sexual scandals her brilliant daughter escaped, and a subject Ms. Erickson's sensitivity to sexual and political nuance should well serve." Indeed, Carolly Erickson could have chosen no more fascinating and appropriate the grasp of historians for centuries.

Through her extraordinarily vivid re-creation of this most tragic chapter in all Tudor history, Carolly Erickson gives us unprecedented insight into the singularity of Anne Boleyn's life, the dark, and overwhelming forces that shaped her errant destiny, and the rare, tumultuous times in which she lived.

Chosen as a Book of the Year in The Times and the Daily Mail 'Highly entertaining' Sunday Times 'Enthralling' Daily Telegraph For more than six decades, Queen Victoria ruled a great Empire at the height of its power. Beside her for more than twenty of those years was the love of her life, her trusted husband and father of their nine children, Prince Albert. But while Victoria is seen as the embodiment of her time, it was Prince Albert, A. N. Wilson expertly argues, who was at the vanguard of Victorian Britain's transformation as a vibrant and extraordinary centre of political, technological, scientific and intellectual advancement. A composer, engineer, soldier, politician, linguist and bibliophile, Prince Albert, more than any other royal, was truly a 'genius'.

An epic story of wars and revolutions, of the rise and fall of royal families, and of the birth of modern Germany is brilliantly told through the lives of the couple in the eye of the storm--Queen Victoria's eldest daughter, and her handsome, idealistic husband, Crown Prince Frederick of Prussia. of photos.

The acclaimed Penguin Monarchs series: short, fresh, expert accounts of England's rulers - now in paperback The elder daughter of Henry VIII, Mary I (1553-58) became England's ruler on the unexpected death of her brother Edward VI. Her short reign is one of the great potential turning points in the country's history. As a convinced Catholic and the wife of Philip II, king of Spain and the most powerful of all European monarchs, Mary could have completely changed her country's orbit, making it a province of the Habsburg Empire and obedient again to Rome. These extraordinary possibilities are fully dramatized in John Edward's superb short biography. The real Mary I has almost disappeared under the great mass of Protestant propaganda that buried her reputation during her younger sister, Elizabeth I's reign. But what if she had succeeded?

In this remarkable biography, Carolly Erickson brings Elizabeth I to life and allows us to see her as a living, breathing, elegant, flirtatious, diplomatic, violent, arrogant, and outrageous woman who commands our attention, fascination, and awe.

With the special skill for which she is acclaimed, Carolly Erickson electrifies the senses as she evokes with total fidelity the brilliant colors of Elizabethan clothing and jewelry, the texture of tapestries, and even the close, perfumed air of castle rooms, Erickson demonstrates her extraordinary ability to discern and bring to life psychological and physical reality.

Most people have a preconcieved image of Edward VII: a short, stocky man with a distinctive beard, more noted for his lascivious disposition and passion for sports than diplomatic gestures. Like most caricatures, the picture bears an element of truth. This biography of Edward VII however, sets out to show that he was a more successful king than he was given credit for. It seeks to go beyond the myth to present a picture of Edward as both monarch and family man.;The book covers his years as Prince of Wales, the strictly regimented upbringing, the death of Prince Albert and the scandals resulting from his private affairs. This leads on to coverage of his years as king. While the book looks at aspects of Edward VII's constitutional life as king, it is primarily a study of the man whose personal impact on society was of paramount importance in the establishing of an era. His marriage to the highly influential Alexandra is also re-examined as a partnership of enduring affection which withstood all his womanizing and also challenged accepted ideas of child-raising. The golden age of the country-house party, sporting celebrations and diplomatic pursuits are captured in early photographs.