This was forced on the Princely lines when they were driven out during the 1848 revolution and only restored at the point of Prussian bayonets, at which point the King of Prussia forced them to hand over sovereignty of the two principalities to Prussia. They continue to own the land and property but not as sovereigns and the Prussian King bought part of the palace. The Prussians then, in 1851, declared that the House Order was a Prussian Royal Order but allowed the two Fursts (as Sigmaringen and Hechingen had not yet united) to award it themselves, but the two were effectively separate Orders - the Furst was a "grand commander" of the Prussian Order, as were all the Prussian princes. The king of Prussia declared that all knights of the Black Eagle would receive the 1st class of the Prussian Order, all Princes of Hohenzollern at birth received the 1st class (including the Romanian Princes). Since 1918 the two Orders have effectively separated again, with the Furst awarding it without any reference to the head of the Prussian line. There were various changes and additions to the grades including the addition of lady members. In 1935 because the Nazi government prohibited awards of the House Orders in 1935, the Furst went to Bucharest to meet with King Carol and the Order was converted into a Romanian royal Order, but which could be awarded by both the King and the Furst, although the King had a rather grander collar. When Carol was deposed and the pro-Nazi dictatorship took over the new government declared the Romanian Hohenzollern House Order suspended and instead founded the Romanian Order of St George. Carol, however, continued to award the Order until his death while making some changes to the grades. Then, in 1941, although the Furst had had no contacts with Romania since Carol's deposition, he added some further classes making ten in all plus two medals. All Princes of Hohenzollern and Romania were to receive the grand cross (actually now the 2nd class, because there was also a collar grade) at birth, all Princesses at 16. One would assume that at least theoretically, King Michael's daughters were grand crosses of this Order. The head of the house of Prussia is believed to award this very sparingly, but I could not find any evidence to confirm this. The statutory award to all Prussian princes at birth would still apply.



--Previous Message--
: According to Wikipedia, there are two
: sovereigns of the 'Princely House Order of
: Hohenzollern':
:
: Fürst Karl Friedrich of Hohenzollern
: Prince Georg Friedrich of Prussia
:
: --Previous Message--
: Could someone tell me who the Grandmaster of
: Fürstlich Hohenzollernsche Hausorden is?
:
: