Marie of Romania’s Heart Returned to Pelişor Castle

The late Queen Marie of Romania’s heart was returned to her place of death yesterday, in a ceremony attended by her great-granddaughter Crown Princess Margarita, as well as her descendants in the Austria-Tuscany line.

Beginning at the National Museum of Romanian History, the silver casket containing the British-born Queen’s heart was given a military farewell in front of a crowded street before it was placed into a car and driven to Pelişor Castle in Sinai. King Michael was also present at the Museum for the farewell.

Romanian soldiers carry the casket containing the heart of the late Queen Marie during a ceremony before it’s return to Pelişor Castle

Once at the Castle, a residence of Queen Marie and her family and where the Queen died in 1938, representatives of Romania, Moldova and Britain – as well as various religious figures – watched as Crown Princess Margarita placed the gold box and Archduchess Maria Magdalena of Austria the silver casket onto a table behind a sofa in the Golden Hall.

It was the popular Queen’s wish that, upon death, her heart be removed from her body and be kept in a silver box at a specifically designed chapel in Balchik. When the town was ceded to Bulgaria in 1940, the Queen’s heart was taken to Bran Castle before being transferred to the National Museum of Romanian History in Bucharest when the castle was seized by the Communist Regime in 1948.

The ceremony yesterday realised her wish.

Filed under Historical Royals, Romania, The United Kingdom
Tagged Archduchess Maria Magdalena of Austria, Crown Princess Margareta of Romania, Marie of Edinburgh, Mihai I of Romania, Pelişor Castle.