Monday, March 23, 2009

Bayern-Auersperg nuptials

HRH Princess Alice of Bavaria will marry HSH Prince Lukas of Auersperg on August 29, 2009. There been no public announcement of the engagement, but Dutch royal enthusiast Netty Leistra found the forthcoming marriage while searching through bridal registry lists. She found a listing for Alice Bayern and Lukas Auersperg, who are getting married on August 29, 2009.
It is possible that the couple are already married. Alice's older sister, Dr. Auguste von Bayern, who is a member of the Behavioral Ecology Research group at Oxford University. She refers to a collaboration with Alice Auersperg at the University of Vienna.
In most European countries, the religious wedding is not the legal marriage. Civil marriages are the legal marriages with the exception of the United Kingdom and Ireland and Scandinavia, where religious and civil weddings are recognized as equal.
The princess, who has a degree in zoology from Edinburgh university, and who is now working on her doctorate at the University of Vienna, is the second of five children of Prince Luitpold of Bavaria and his wife, the former Beatrix Wiegand. Prince Luitpold, who manages the family brewery at Kaltenberg, is second in line to the Bavarian succession, and will one day be the head of the Royal House of Bavaria.
Prince Lukas is the eldest child and only son of Prince and Princess Andreas of Auersperg, who will celebrate their 30th anniversary on April 21.
Alice and Lukas, both of whom were born in 1981, met at Edinburgh University in Scotland. Lukas studied engineering.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

So Auguste is an ecologist and Alice a zoologist, an interesting theme running through there. Do you know what the three boys are studying?
Oh and thank you for the postcard.

Anonymous said...

since 1.1.2009 a new law came into force in German: one can marry first in church without having previouly been civilly been married. But one has to do it later as only the civil marriage triggers the legal consequences.

Marlene Eilers Koenig said...

thus the point of the law means nothing. Here in the US, all weddings are "civil" in the sense that the license to marry comes from the local authority. The bride and groom go to the courthouse, fill out the forms, and then you can get married. The license allows you to get married by someone who is authorized by the the local authority -- this could be a judge, a pastor, a priest, a rabbi and so on. You give the license to the person who is doing the marriage and after the wedding, he or she signs it with all the details, and the filled out document is returned to the court to be registered -- and after that, one can get a notarized copy (which a bride usually needs to show to change her name). Thus, you can have a religious wedding (and a religious wedding does not have to take place in a church or a temple) but the permission to marry comes from the civil authority. I think a much better idea that having to require a civil wedding -- just allow the civil authorities to issue the paperwork - and then allow the bride and groom to choose where they want to marry - by a judge or who ever is authorized to perform civil marriages or a religious wedding ...

Anonymous said...

Well, different states, different systems. In all states paperwork is required.

One has to see it from a historical perspective. This makes it clear why the old system existed and what developments have taken place since then and why this new system came into place beginning this year.

Marlene Eilers Koenig said...

Canada, the UK, Ireland and the Scandinavian countries also recognize religious weddings as legal. Yes, it is the paperwork, but the idea is the bride and groom have the option where to marry. Weddings can take place just about anywhere ... a civil wedding does not have to take place in the judge's office, for example. religious weddings can take place outside a church, even on a beach.