Categotry Archives: Royalty

To the Balobedu people of South Africa, Queen Makobo Constance Modjadji VI was a woman with the magical ability to control the clouds and rivers.
Known as the rain queen of the northern Limpopo province, she allegedly received her supernatural powers from her grandmother, Queen Mokope Modjadji V, who died in 2001. For two years, Modjadji governed the Balobedu, one of only a few tribes in Africa with a female line of succession. She ruled through a council of men and was forbidden from marrying.
Despite its mystical nature, the queen’s power was so feared that other tribes avoided the Balobedu, even while warring with each other. In times of drought, caravans of gifts were sent to the rain queen in order to gain her favor. African leaders, such as former presidents Nelson Mandela and F.W. de Klerk, visited with past rain queens. The rain queen even received a government salary, since the mystique of her post boosted tourism to the region.
Born in 1978, Modjadji was the daughter of Princess Maria Makheala, who was heir to the throne until her death two days before Queen Modjadji V. In April 2003, Modjadji was reluctantly enthroned in an elaborate, formal ceremony. On the day of her coronation, a light drizzle fell from the sky. This, the tribe’s elders believed, was a good omen.
At 25, Modjadji was the tribe’s sixth and youngest rain queen. Although revered for her talents and lineage, many considered her to be too modern for such a post. Custom dictated that rain queens live reclusive existences, hidden in the royal kraal with their “wives,” or ladies-in-waiting. Modjadji, however, was a formally educated woman. She liked to wear jeans and T-shirts, visit nearby discos, watch soap operas and chat on her cell phone.
Modjadji also found disfavor with the royal council for having a son and a daughter with her boyfriend, David Mohale, who is a married man and a commoner. Only suitors of royal blood — men approved by the royal council — are supposed to mate with the rain queen.
Modjadji died on June 12 at the age of 27. Local news media said the medical reports list the cause of death as “chronic meningitis,” but Mohale claims Modjadji was poisoned.
On the night before the rain queen’s burial, a fire broke out in the building where her body was located. Firefighters were called to the royal complex and saved her coffin from being destroyed. The cause of the fire is under investigation.
Although family members were the only ones allowed to attend Modjadji’s funeral on June 20, thousands of mourners gathered outside the Royal Cemetery at Ga-Modjadji to pay their respects. A seventh rain queen has not been named.

Princess Kikuko, the oldest member of the Japanese royal family and the aunt of Emperor Akihito, died on Dec. 18 of blood poisoning. She was 92.
Kikuko was the granddaughter of Yoshinobu Tokugawa, the last shogun of the Edo period (1603-1868). A woman with modern ideals, Kikuko graduated from Gakushuin Women’s College before marrying Prince Takamatsu, a son of Emperor Taisho, in 1930.
Kikuko became a champion of cancer research in 1933 when her mother, Mieko Tokugawa, died of the disease. The following year, she began donating radium, a substance used in cancer treatment, to the Japanese Foundation for Cancer Research. In 1968, Kikuko established the Princess Takamatsu Cancer Research Fund, a trust that allocates public monies to groundbreaking cancer research. Despite these efforts, her husband died of lung cancer in 1987.
Prince Takamatsu’s diaries were found four years after his death. The 20 volumes included personal commentary about the royal family and criticism of the military establishment before and during World War II. Although the Imperial Household Agency asked her to keep the diaries private, Kikuko allowed them to be published in an eight-volume set (“Takamatsunomiya Nikki”) in 1995.
To honor the birth of Princess Aiko in December 2001, Kikuko published an article in a Japanese women’s magazine that called for a change in succession rules to allow a female Imperial family member to ascend to the Chrysanthemum Throne. She was the first member of the royal family to publicly request such reform.

HRH Princess Alice, the Duchess of Gloucester and the oldest member of the British royal family, died on Oct. 29. Cause of death was not released. She was 102.
Born Lady Alice Christabel Montagu-Douglas-Scott, she was the third daughter of John Montagu-Douglas-Scott, the seventh Duke of Buccleuch. In 1935, Alice married Prince Henry, the third son of King George V and Queen Mary, at a private ceremony in Buckingham Palace. The couple had two sons — Prince William and Prince Richard. William died in 1972 when a plane he was flying crashed at an air show.
Before her husband’s death in 1974, the prince and princess traveled all over the world performing their royal duties. During World War II, Princess Alice worked with the Red Cross and ran the Women’s Royal Air Force in 1940. She later worked for numerous charities and became an accomplished watercolorist. Her autobiography, “The Memoirs of Princess Alice, Duchess of Gloucester,” was published in 1981.
The mother of the present Duke of Gloucester and the aunt of Queen Elizabeth II, Princess Alice spent her final years living in Barnwell Manor, an Elizabethan building in rural Northamptonshire, and at Kensington Palace in London.

Juliana Louise Emma Marie Wilhelmina, Princess of Orange-Nassau and former Queen of The Netherlands, died on March 20 from pneumonia. She was 94.
The only child of Queen Wilhelmina and Prince Hendrik, Juliana studied literature and religion at Leiden University. During the Depression of the early 1930s, she represented the Royal House at many official events and served as president of The Netherlands Red Cross. Juliana and her family were briefly forced to flee to England when the Nazi army invaded The Netherlands in 1940. She spent several years living in Canada then returned to her impoverished homeland after the war ended.
Juliana was 39 years old when she took the throne in 1948. Over the next three decades, she helped rebuild her country, officially ended 346 years of colonial rule in the former Dutch East Indies and oversaw the recognition of an independent Indonesia.
Known as a kind and down-to-earth monarch, Juliana was also active in social issues. She frequently visited hospitals and retirement homes, and toured the southern provinces of Zeeland and South Holland during the floods of 1953, in which 1,800 people died. Her children attended public school, and she was often spotted riding her bicycle or shopping at the local supermarket.
Although she abdicated the throne to her daughter Beatrix in 1980, Juliana remained popular with her subjects. The Dutch continued to celebrate their national holiday on her birthday, despite the fact that she declined the title of queen mother and chose to be called princess instead. Her final years were spent in seclusion.

Princess Lalla Fatima Zohra of Morocco died on Sept. 15. Cause of death was not released. She was 77.
Born in 1926, Zohra was the daughter of Sultan Moulay Abdelaziz, and King Muhammed VI ben Hassan’s sister. Unlike other princesses of the time, Zohra received a European education. This liberal upbringing instilled a sense of independence in Zohra, so she was horrified when her father arranged a marriage with his cousin, Prince Moulay Ben El Mehdi Alaoui. Despite her protests, Zohra was engaged to the prince when she was 16 years old.
Shortly after the betrothal, the sultan died, leaving Zohra in charge of his household and harem. Until her marriage five years later, Zohra trained with the Red Cross and worked as a nurse.
When Morocco gained its independence from France in 1957, Zohra’s husband became the first ambassador to London. Zohra reveled in her newfound freedom, and was noted in the British press for her shopping excursions and jaunts to the theatre and ballet.
After a tour through Italy, the couple returned to Morocco where Zohra began a career in social philanthropy. Known as the “Princess of the Poor,” Zohra encouraged women to educate their daughters and to move back the age of marriage. She also served as the chairwoman of the Moroccan Women National Union, an organization that helped thousands of women gain economic self-sufficiency.
In 2001, Zohra denounced the media’s lack of sensitivity on “the serious threat of AIDS.” Morocco had previously shunned the public discussion of the disease. This year, she was appointed a Commander of the Legion d’Honneur.