The moment Princess Margriet were to become HM the Queen of the Netherlands, her oldest son is HRH the Prince of Orange and his oldest daughter Anastasia would be second in line of succession followed by her brother Lucas and sister Felicia. Margriet's second son Bernhard and his three children would also be automatically in line of succession.
The three children of Princess Madeleine of Sweden have been treated equally to those of her brother Prince Carl-Philip both are junior lines of the Swedish Royal House.
It will be interesting to see how the children of Isabella, Vincent and Josephine of Denmark will be treated but i would not be surprised if all of them would be treated in a similar fashion when it comes down to becoming HH prince(ss) of Denmark. Assuming all four children of the crown prince marry with consent.
Than there is princess Charlotte of Cambridge. She is the first princess in British history ahead of her younger brother so that might very well have consequences to how her offspring and that of brother Louis are styled.
In Belgium the children of the King's sister Astrid all five are HRH prince(ss) of Belgium and they are in line of succession before their uncle Prince Laurent and his children so they are another junior line through a female.
In Spain and Portugal we have seen children of an Infanta styled aa Infante/Infanta and being an junior line to the main branch of the dynasty.
In the Romanov dynasty they lacked male heirs when Peter II died. The house however continued in two separate branches stemming from his paternal grandfather Peter I and great-uncle Ivan V. Both those branches were female line. Empress Anna and Empress Elisabeth were both daughters of Ivan V and Peter I respectively and their chosen male successors were descendants of their sisters so once again a female line constituted a junior or more precisely rival branch to the dynasty.
…is not really a good example. The titles and names in each generation have to be set by royal decree (which wasn’t the case through the male line) and they are not quite consistent.
And, still, they all bear their male line titles and names…
There are modern examples of women starting a cadet branch of a reigning dynasty:
the four sons of Princess Margriet of the Netherlands and her husband Pieter van Vollenhoven are HH prince of Orange-Nassau, van Vollenhoven and were until the succession of King Willem-Alexander in line of succession to the Dutch throne.
The three children of Princess Madeleine of Sweden can be considered a junior branch of the Swedish Royal House.
In both cases the father is not himself part of another reigning dynasty and the children are in line of succession to the throne of the dynasty their mother belongs to.
The current Dutch King has three daughters. The oldest one will continue the Royal line. The two younger ones might see their offspring styled like that of their uncles => count(ess) of Orange-Nassau if they happen to be male than they can continue the county house of Orange-Nassau. Countesses are able to pass on the surname Van Oranje-Nassau van Amsberg in the case of the daughters of Friso and Constantijn. All of them could be considered junior branches of the Dutch Royal house as well.
We might see similar things happening in other monarchies where women now have full succession rights regardless of gender.
Like Andrew, I also consider cadet branches those issued from a younger male descendant of a monarch .
Having said that, what we now call the Windsors are, at the moment, a cadet branch of the house of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, who will be replaced, in the next generation by the cadet branch of the Greek RF, itself a cadet branch of the Danish RF, itself a cadet branch of the Oldenburg ducal family.
Norway could never be considered as a branch of the Coburg- Windsors .
Maud married Pr.Charles of Denmark in 1896, during Victoria's reign , many years before the british SCGothas changed their name to Windsor
Charles/Haakon and Maud started another cadet branch of the danish royal house.
If you consider the Norwegian RF a branch of the Coburgs, you would have to consider the Prussian R&IF as well as they descend from Victoria and Albert's eldest daughter Vicky, and that is rubbish.
They are family, but they do not form a branch of the BRF.
The only cadet branch of the BRF issued from V&A is the ducal house of Saxe-Coburg, descending from Pr.Leopold, since both Pr.Alfred and Pr.Arthur's male offspring are extinct.
The only of Edward VII's son to leave descendants was George V, and through him, there are the cadet branches of Gloucester and Kent.
I've always considered branches to be cadet lines established by Male Line descendants.
Of course, following THAT reasoning one comes up with the Windsors actually being nothing more than a cadet branch of the Greek royal Family!
Recently, we've had discussions about some royal families having branches made of descendants of a certain monarch of the family. With Victoria and Albert. there must have been several of these what with their many children. Their son became Edward VII and his daughter Maud soon became Queen of Norway. Is the royal family of Norway considered a branch of the Coburg-Windsors?
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