Hedvig Elisabetha Charlotta

[ElisabethChristine]

Hello all,


I am a historian and my special field is royalty - I am new here though! I am interested in Hedvig Elisabetha Charlotta (the beautiful portrait by Roslin is hopefully appearing on my profile/avatar). Her famous "dagboeker" or "diaries" are renowned in Sweden for their describing the court of Gustav III - written in French originally but were translated in the 30s by Caecila av Klercker. Has anyone ever come across a volume of these diaries - they appear next to scarce. The Swedish "Riksarchivet" or Landarchive have told me they will not likely be translated into any other language. What a pity because Queen Hedvig Elisabetha Charlotta was so remarkable.

Best wishes and it is nice to be here,
Elisabeth-Christine

[Artemisia]

Welcome, ElisabethChristine!
I share your fascination with Hedvig Elisabeth Charlotte, especially her relationships with her brother-in-law, Gustav III, and Jean Baptiste Bernadotte. She was truly a fasinating woman, and had she agreed to become regent for Crown Prince Carl Gustav, Swedish history could have been quite different.
I have never come across the complete volumes of her diaries, but I did read some excerpts from her diaries, albeit in French.

[Meraude]

There is a copy of her diary online in a Swedish translation from 1902 at Open Library, Hedvig Elisabeth Charlottas dagbok (Open Library) The translations by Cecilia af Klercker are available at a number of Swedish libraries.

[MagMil]

Lovely posts

[ElisabethChristine]

Thank you very much ladies for your kind welcome and posts :) The Swedish Riksarchivet wrote to me that though the originals were in French, it seems unlikely that a French translation was made in book form. It would be a huge projekt in translation - as her diaries go on to at least ten volumes. Meraude - tack ska du ha för linken med hennes dagboeken i översättning Svenska-Franska! Artemsia - how did you become interested in Hedvig? It is unusual for us outside of Sweden to become interested in her - how nice to meet you.

[Artemisia]

Originally Posted by ElisabethChristine

Artemsia - how did you become interested in Hedvig? It is unusual for us outside of Sweden to become interested in her - how nice to meet you.

Rather accidentally; many years ago I've been researching history (well, mainly family tree) of the House of Bernadotte, and her name surfaced in connection with Jean Baptiste Bernadotte. I started reading about her and became quite interested, especially since Hedvig's character provides one of those ever-interesting "what if" type of questions. What if she agreed to become a Regent? What if she strongly opposed Jean Baptiste? How the history of Sweden would have changed?