Georgie, Nicky and Willy weren't only cousins on the eve of World War I, they were also the heads of European dynasties: King George V of Britain, Czar Nicholas II of Russia, and Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany.
George, Wilhelm, and Nicholas's wife Alexandra had a common grandmother, Queen Victoria of Great Britain, who considered herself all German and insisted that her children converse in German as well as English. She was just one member of the proud Saxe-Coburg family, whose various lines inhabited the ruling houses of Great Britain, Belgium, Portugal, Bulgaria and the Saxe-Coburg principality itself within Germany.
A common language for common bloodlines was important, just as the ruling houses had to master a variety of languages to communicate with their subjects.
As much as Queen Victoria cherished the German language, Czar Nicholas II wrote to his German-born wife in English, just as he did in hundreds of personal letters to the German Kaiser. The Queen of the Belgians, Marie Henriette, was born an Austrian archduchess and spoke fluent Hungarian because of her father. Her husband, King Leopold II, spoke French, German and Flemish.
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