Windsor Primer: RDNA-verse FIN

An Excerpt from The Primer on Ruling Monarchies in the RDNA-verse, 2024.
Source: [REDACTED]

The House of Windsor-Romanov

Formed from the merger between the two great houses of Europe, the Windsor-Romanovs hold sway over what remains of the British Empire and Commonwealth, led by the young Victoria III since her coronation in 2010. It should be stressed, however, that for all intents and purposes the dynasty is a continuation of the British line, being predominant over the Romanov side of the family even though it also claims legitimacy over the former Russian Empire.

The dynasty can be traced to the intermingling of the ruling Hanoverian and Saxe-Coburg-Gotha families in the late 18th to early 19th Century. In a move that served to further emphasize their connection with the peoples of Britain, in 1815 King George IV decided to name his line after Windsor Castle, near London with Parliament's consent. From that point, the kings and queens of the United Kingdom ruled unopposed on behalf of an Empire that (at its peak) stretched from the increasingly industrial lands of Canada to regal India and the Australian frontier. Through hardship, reforms and occasional conflict, their line would see Britannia become an enlightened world power well into the early 20th Century, even as internal subversion threatened to tear it apart.

That the Terror brought changes in their history is an understatement. In 1924-25, the Royal Navy succeeded in finding and retrieving surviving members of the Romanov line, Tsar Mikhail II staying behind in St. Petersburg to help hold off a Reds. Initially political refugees, the remnants of the Russian throne decided to make good use of their close ties to the royal family. Thus as the chaos became global, Crown Prince Alexei of Russia was married to Crown Princess Victoria II, the former assuming the name Alexander I upon his coronation in 1935. Their popularity with the Commonwealth further solidified with the King's decision to hold out with the rest of his countrymen during the Invasion of 1942-44.

Today, the dynasty "resides" in Loyalist Canada, now long the effective heart of a still mighty Britannia, their "official residences" in the U.K. Protectorate little more than symbolic offices at best. Many of its members have left their mark either in civil and charity ventures or serving alongside the men and women of the Royal and Commonwealth Armed Forces; many in the local press see them as increasingly more Canadian than British. In the case of the Russian side of the family, however, there still remains some vague hope of one day reclaiming their ancestors' distant homeland. And with the help of Tsarist and Ukrainian Revivalists, if not their friends in Royal Intelligence, it is not as far-fetched a dream as it initially seems.

List of Windsor-Romanov Monarchs by Reign since the Terror:*

George VII (1912 - 1935)
Alexander I (1935 - 1958)
Victoria II (1958 - 1965)
Edward IX (1965 - 2009)
Victoria III (2010 - )

*Their official titles as of the present are as "HM King/Queen of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the Loyalist Dominion of Canada and British Commonwealth." The traditional Romanov title of "Tsar/Empress of All Russias" is not often used.