Everything about Prince Christian Of Denmark totally explained
Prince Christian Valdemar Henri John of Denmark,
Count of Monpezat (; born
15 October 2005) is a member of the
Danish Royal Family. He is the son of
Crown Prince Frederik and his wife, the
Australian born
Crown Princess Mary. He is a grandson of
Queen Margrethe II of
Denmark and her husband
Prince Henrik. He has a younger sister,
Princess Isabella.
Birth
Prince Christian was born on
October 15, 2005 in
Rigshospitalet, the Copenhagen University Hospital, at 1:57am. He was healthy with an
apgar score of 10 (out of 10) after 1 minute. At birth, he weighed 3.5 kg (7.7 lb) and was 51 cm (20 in) long. At noon on the day of his birth
21-gun salutes were fired from the Sixtus Battery at
Holmen in Copenhagen and at
Kronborg Castle to mark the birth of a royal child. At the same time, public buses and official buildings flew the Danish flag,
the Dannebrog. At sunset on the same day beacon bonfires were lit all over Denmark, while Naval Home Guard vessels lit their searchlights and directed them towards the capital. A few bonfires were also lit in celebration in Australia.
Brief hospitalisation
Prince Christian was hospitalised briefly on
21 October 2005 because he suffered from
neonatal jaundice, a usually harmless illness and a fairly common one (especially in premature births). The first photographs of the then 3-day-old boy showed a yellow tinge to his face and hands. The prince was examined by doctors and underwent blood tests, then spent time in a light box under special coloured light rays to break down the
bilirubin substance which causes jaundice. His parents took him home again the same day and he made a full recovery.
Name and christening
Prince Christian was christened on
21 January 2006 in
Christiansborg Palace Church by Bishop Erik Norman Svendsen. Christian has eight godparents. They are
Crown Prince Haakon of Norway, his wife
Crown Princess Mette-Marit,
Crown Princess Victoria of Sweden,
Prince Joachim of Denmark,
Crown Prince Pavlos of Greece (Frederik's cousin, son of
Queen Anne-Marie), Jane Stephens (Mary's eldest sister) and two friends of the couple, Jeppe Handwerk and Hamish Campbell.
His forenames all have a family significance:
- Christian is after his great-great-grandfather, King Christian X of Denmark, continuing the Danish royal tradition of the heir apparent being named either Christian or Frederik.
- Valdemar is after the former King Valdemar IV Atterdag. It is also a common royal name – both the Prince's uncle Joachim and his cousin Felix, Joachim's second son, have Valdemar or Waldemar as one of their names.
- Henri is after his paternal grandfather, Prince Consort Henrik, whose given name is Henri.
- John is after his maternal grandfather, John Donaldson.
He received a number of presents on the occassion of his christening, including a pony called Flikflak from the
Folketing, Denmark's national parliament.
Succession and the constitution
As the firstborn child of the heir apparent, Christian is second-in-line to the
Danish throne; at the accession of Frederik or his premature death, Christian will become
heir apparent. Since the
16th century, first-born sons of Danish monarchs have traditionally been alternately named Frederik and Christian;
Queen Margrethe, while naturally interrupting this sequence, treated herself as a "Christian" for the purposes of alternation, coming between one Frederik (
her father) and, presumably, another (
her son). Prince Christian will likewise presumably be known as "King Christian XI of Denmark" (following his great-great-grandfather
Christian X in that name).
The possibility Mary could be expecting a female child motivated Danish politicians to consider the possibility of gender-neutral succession. Formerly Denmark's throne followed absolute male ("
salic") primogeniture; this was altered by the
1953 Act of Succession, which introduced male-preference ("cognatic")
primogeniture, which gives daughters a place in the succession, but behind their brothers. This change allowed the present queen (Margrethe) to become heiress-presumptive and eventually inherit the throne. While
Crown Princess Mary was still pregnant with Christian, the
Folketing began the lengthy process (which would need in the end the approval of two parliaments and a
referendum) to change the
Danish constitution to allow absolute or equal primogeniture, treating males and females interchangeably. The birth of a boy removed some urgency from this drive, but it remains in motion, having received the first necessary parliamentary approval.
On
11 September 2006,
Per Stig Møller, Denmark's Minister for Foreign Affairs, formally wrote and signed a hand-written document naming Prince Christian as heir to the Danish throne in the
line of succession. The prince's full name, his dates of birth and christening, and the names of his godparents were recorded as dictated by the Royal Law of 1799.
Christian Valdemar Viking
In 2006
Scandinavian Airlines System was in the process of purchasing new A319 aircraft; and in Christian's honor the first of these, delivered on
8 August 2006, was named
Christian Valdemar Viking.
Nursery School
On
27 March 2007 Prince Christian started nursery school at Queen Louise's Children's House, located 35 km north of Copenhagen in Fredensborg where the Crown Prince family lives. Prince Christian walked inside accompanied by his parents and is having sessions there to aid his socialisation, according to comments made by his mother. The nursery school bears the name of Christian's
ancestor Queen Louise of Denmark.
Christian is the first member of the Danish Royal Family, and first future Danish king, to attend daycare. At the same age, Crown Prince Frederik had a nanny at the palace.
Titles, styles, honours and arms
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