Description: Against the odds, monarchies flourished in nineteenth-century Europe. In an era marked by dramatic change and revolutionary upheaval, Europe's monarchies experienced an unexpected late flowering. Royal Heirs focuses on the roles and personalities of the heirs to the throne from more than a dozen different dynasties that ruled the continent between the French Revolution and the end of the First World War. The book explores how these individuals contributed to the remarkable survival of the crowns they were born to wear. Constitutions, family relationships, education, politics, the media, the need to generate 'soft power' and the militarisation of monarchy all shaped the lives of princes and princesses while they were playing their part to embody and secure the future of monarchy. Ranging from Norway to Spain and from Greece to Britain, Royal Heirs not only paints a vivid picture of a monarchical age, but also explores how such disparate monarchies succeeded in adapting to change and defending their position.
Brief description: Frank Lorenz Müller is Professor of Modern History at the University of St Andrews. Between 2012 and 2017, he led a major research project on the role of heirs in nineteenth-century monarchies. His publications include Britain and the German Question (2002), Our Fritz. Emperor Frederick III and the Political Culture of Imperial Germany (2011) and, as co-editor, Royal Heirs and the Uses of Soft Power in Nineteenth-Century Europe (2016). He is founder-editor of the 'Palgrave Studies in Modern Monarchy'.
Review Quotes: 'A very substantial contribution to our understanding of monarchy and politics in the "long" nineteenth century. For those who do not know much already about the period, Müller is a master at disentangling the various dynastic skeins, and weaving them back into a comprehensible story.' Brendan Simms, author of Europe: The Struggle for Supremacy, 1453 to the Present