Queen Margrethe II. - A referendum once brought her to the throne: the colorful admonisher abdicates
"I'll stay on the throne until I drop", Danish Queen Margrethe II used to say - now Europe's longest-serving monarch has changed her mind. In her New Year's address on Sunday, the 83-year-old surprisingly announced her abdication on January 14 - her 52nd anniversary on the throne. The popular monarch, nicknamed Daisy, will be succeeded by her son Frederik.
What Margrethe II announced in her speech, recorded in Copenhagen's Amalienborg Palace, is likely to worry many Danes. "Many of us have never experienced another monarch," explained Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen. "Queen Margrethe is the embodiment of Denmark and over the years has put into words values and feelings for what we are as a people and as a nation," said the head of government, praising the 83-year-old.
Since the death of her distant cousin Elizabeth II, Margrethe is the last queen to reign in Europe. More than 80 percent of Danes describe themselves as monarchists. They came in their thousands to celebrate Margrethe's 50th anniversary on the throne in 2022. However, a back operation in February led the monarch to conclude that "it is time to pass on the responsibility to the next generation".
Queen Margrethe II: She was artistically and socially active
The Queen was born in Copenhagen on April 16, 1940, just one week after Nazi Germany invaded her homeland. The eldest of three sisters was initially not allowed to become queen under the Danish law of succession to the throne. After a referendum in 1953, women were allowed to ascend the throne.
Margrethe was 31 years old when she ascended the throne of Europe's oldest monarchy on January 14, 1972, still in mourning for her father King Frederik IX. At the time, she was already married to the French Count Henri de Laborde de Monpezat and had two sons with him - four-year-old Frederik and three-year-old Joachim. In 2018, her husband, who suffered from dementia and lung disease, died at the age of 83 after 50 years of marriage.
Always dressed in colorful outfits, the monarch is known for her optimism and social commitment. Her speeches to her people are more direct and less formal than those of other European monarchs.
And even though she only has a representative function in Denmark's constitutional monarchy and rarely intervened in politics, Margrethe II did act as an admonisher from time to time. One of her much-noticed statements dates back to 1984, when she reprimanded the Danes for their "stupid remarks" and "coldness" towards immigrants.
"She has managed to be a queen who has united the Danish nation in a time of great change: Globalization, the emergence of the multicultural state, economic crises in the 1970s and 1980s and again in the years 2008 to 2015, as well as the corona pandemic," summed up historian Lars Hovebakke Sörensen on the 50th anniversary of the throne.
In addition to her duties as Queen, the grandmother of eight has many other areas of activity. As a linguistically gifted intellectual who studied at Cambridge and the Sorbonne and speaks fluent English, French, German and Swedish, she has been involved in several translations. In 1981, for example, the Danish translation of Simone de Beauvoir's novel "All men are mortal" was published under a pseudonym with her husband.
The Queen has also designed costumes and stage sets for plays and television series and illustrated a new edition of J.R.R. Tolkien's classic "The Lord of the Rings" published in 2002. Her paintings, some of which are abstract, are exhibited in Danish museums and galleries as well as abroad.
In this and other ways, Margrethe II has adapted the Danish monarchy to the present day, which can look back on more than a thousand years of history since it was founded by Harald Bluetooth. One of her few known vices, smoking, does not detract from her popularity - especially as she no longer does it in public.
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Source: www.stern.de
