| Ernst August | |
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| Period | 9 December 1987 - present |
| Predecessor | Ernest Augustus IV |
| Heir apparent | Prince Ernst August |
| Spouse | Chantal Hochuli (m.1981-div.1997) Caroline, Hereditary Princess of Monaco (m.1999) |
| Issue | |
| Ernst August Christian Alexandra |
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| Full name | |
| Ernst August Albert Paul Otto Rupprecht Oskar Berthold Friedrich-Ferdinand Christian-Ludwig[1] | |
| House | House of Hanover |
| Father | Ernest Augustus, Prince of Hanover |
| Mother | Princess Ortrud of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg |
| Born | 24 February 1954 Hanover, Lower Saxony, Germany |
Ernst August, Prince of Hanover (Ernst August Albert Paul Otto Rupprecht Oskar Berthold Friedrich-Ferdinand Christian-Ludwig Prinz von Hannover[2] born 26 February 1954 in Hanover), is the third husband of Princess Caroline of Monaco, heiress presumptive to the throne of Monaco. He is the head of the deposed royal House of Hanover and claimant to the thrones of the former Kingdom of Hanover and the former Duchy of Brunswick.
He is the eldest son of Ernst August, Hereditary Prince of Brunswick (1914–1987) and his first wife, Princess Ortrud of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (1925–1980). His wealth is estimated at £5 billion.[3]
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Ernst August was christened, Ernst August Albert Paul Otto Rupprecht Oskar Berthold Friedrich-Ferdinand Christian-Ludwig.[1]
As the senior male-line descendant of George V of Hanover Ernst August is head of the House of Hanover (and the House of Welf). As such he is the pretender to the former thrones of the Kingdom of Hanover and of the Duchy of Brunswick. In Prussia (which had annexed Hanover in 1866), "the privileges of former noble status" were dispensed with on 23 June 1920 in execution of the 1919 mandate of the Weimar Constitution,[4] titles being retained only as surnames.[5]
The title of Prince of Great Britain and Ireland was accorded ad personam to his father, Ernest Augustus, Prince of Hanover (1914–1987), and his father's siblings by King George V of the United Kingdom on 17 June 1914.[6] His father was not deprived of that title under the Titles Deprivation Act 1917, but the hereditary Dukedom of Cumberland and Teviotdale and the Earldom of Armagh, borne in 1917 by his paternal great-grandfather, were suspended. However, on 29 August 1931, his grandfather Ernest Augustus, Duke of Brunswick, as head of the House of Hanover, declared the formal resumption, for himself and his dynastic descendants, of use of his former British princely title as a secondary title of pretense.[5]
As heir of the last Duke of Cumberland and Teviotdale and Earl of Armagh, Ernst August has the right to petition under the Titles Deprivation Act 1917 for the restoration of his ancestors' suspended British peerages, but to date he has not done so. His father, also called Ernst August, did, however, successfully claim British nationality after World War II by virtue of a hitherto overlooked (and since repealed) provision of the Sophia Naturalization Act 1705 (Attorney-General v HRH Prince Ernest Augustus of Hanover [1957] 1 All ER 49).
Ernst August is also a great-grandson of the last German emperor, Wilhelm II. Until his marriage to Princess Caroline, he was 385th in the line of succession to the British throne. Upon his marriage to Princess Caroline, a Roman Catholic, he was excluded from the line of succession under provisions of the Act of Settlement 1701. His three children remain in the line of succession since they are being raised as Protestants.
He was also a nephew of Frederica of Hanover, queen consort of the Hellenes. This, in turn, makes him a first cousin of Sophia, Queen of Spain and Constantine II of Greece, whose consort, Queen Anne-Marie of Greece, is the younger sister of Queen Margrethe II of Denmark. He was also the nephew of Prince George William of Hanover, whose wife was Princess Sophie of Greece and Denmark, an elder sister of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, the husband of Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom.
Hanoverian Royal Family |
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Extended royal family
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Ernst August first married, civilly on 28 August 1981 and religiously on 30 August 1981, Chantal Hochuli, heiress to a Swiss chocolate fortune. They had two sons:
Ernst August and Chantal Hochuli divorced on 23 October 1997.
He married secondly, civilly in Monaco on 23 January 1999 Princess Caroline of Monaco, who was pregnant at the time with their daughter:
Since he was born in the male-line of George II of Great Britain he is bound by the Royal Marriages Act 1772. Thus, before his marriage to Princess Caroline, he officially requested permission to marry of Queen Elizabeth II, and on 11 January 1999, the aforementioned sovereign issued an Order in Council, "My Lords, I do hereby declare My Consent to a Contract of Matrimony between His Royal Highness Prince Ernst August Albert of Hanover, Duke of Brunswick-Luneburg and Her Serene Highness Princess Caroline Louise Marguerite of Monaco..." Without the Royal Assent, the marriage would have been void in Britain where his family owns property and his lawful descendants remain in succession to both the British crown and the two suspended peerages. Similarly the Monégasque court officially notified France of Caroline's marriage to Ernst August and received assurance that there was no objection, in compliance with the (since defunct) Franco-Monegasque Treaty of 1918.
He was photographed urinating on the Turkish Pavilion at the Expo 2000 event in Hanover, causing a diplomatic incident and a complaint from the Turkish Embassy accusing him of insulting the Turkish people. He sued those who published (Bild-Zeitung) the photo for invasion of privacy. He was awarded 9,900 euros.[7] The paper had previously published a photo of Ernst August urinating outside a hospital in Austria.[7]
In 2004, he was convicted of aggravated assault and causing grievous bodily harm after beating a man with a knuckleduster.[8][9]
On Monday, 3 April 2005, Ernst August was admitted to hospital with acute pancreatitis. The next day, he fell into a deep coma, two days before the death of his father-in-law, Rainier III, Prince of Monaco. On Friday, 8 April 2005, hospital officials reported that he was no longer in a coma but remained in intensive care. A report the same day on BBC World described his condition as "serious but not irreversible." On 9 April 2005, according to a report on BBC, a hospital spokesman reported that Ernst August was receiving "permanent medical care." He has since been released and was subsequently seen in public with his wife.
As of September 2009, it is reported in the French and English press that he is living separately from his wife Caroline, who has returned to Monaco.[10]
In Germany, the legal privileges of royalty and nobility were abolished in 1919, thereafter for legal purposes, noble titles form part of the name only.[14]
| Patrilineal descent |
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Patrilineal descent, reckoned from father to son, was the principle of membership in Europe's dynasties, including that of Hanover. As such monarchs of the House of Hanover belong patrilineally to the Welf branch of the House of Este). Below is the descent of the heirs male of the House of Hanover concluding with Ernst August, Prince of Hanover according to agnatic primogeniture. For the complete expanded family tree, see List of members of the House of Hanover. Descent before Oberto I is from [1] speculative.
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Prince Ernst August of Hanover (born 1954)
Cadet branch of the House of Welf
Born: 26 February 1954 |
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| Titles in pretence | ||
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| Preceded by Ernest Augustus IV |
— TITULAR — Duke of Cumberland and Teviotdale 9 December 1987 – present Reason for succession failure: Titles Deprivation Act 1917 |
Incumbent Heir: Prince Ernst August of Hanover |
| — TITULAR — King of Hanover 9 December 1987 – present Reason for succession failure: Hanover annexed by Prussia in 1866 |
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| — TITULAR — Duke of Brunswick 9 December 1987 – present Reason for succession failure: Duchy abolished in 1918 |
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