Sophia of Nassau

Sophia of Nassau (Sophia Wilhelmine Marianne Henriette; 9 July 1836 – 30 December 1913) was Queen of Sweden and Norway as the wife of King Oscar II. She was Queen of Sweden for 35 years, longer than anyone before her, and the longest-serving queen until 2011, when she was surpassed by Queen Silvia. She is also the most recent woman to have been officially Dowager Queen of Sweden. Early life Sophia was the youngest daughter of Wilhelm, Duke of Nassau, by his second wife Princess Pauline Friederike Marie of Württemberg. Her father died when she was three and was succeeded by her half-brother Adolphe, Grand Duke of Luxembourg. Sophia was given what was considered a suitable education for princesses at the time by private tutors. She was trained in fencing, a sport normally reserved for males, to strengthen her back and correct her posture. Sophia socialized with academics and artists, and the court of Nassau was considered more democratic than what was usual at most German courts. She learned the English language early on and felt sympathy for the British parliamentarian system. The language spoken in her childhood home was not German but English. Sophia was given what has been referred to as an upbringing more similar to the middle-class Victorian life style, which she preferred rather than a royal one. Her brothers used to refer to her as Unsere demokratische Schwester (our democratic sister). She was described as serious, intelligent and dutiful, and interested in language and history: she was also genuinely religious. In 1848, she witnessed a rebellion in the Duchy of Nassau, which was suppressed by her mother and brothers. She spent the winter of 1853-54 with her mother at the court of her maternal aunt in Saint Petersburg in Russia. Her maternal aunt, Princess Charlotte of Württemberg, was married to Grand Duke Michael Pavlovich of Russia. The trip was not made to arrange a marriage with a Russian prince because her mother did not wish her to convert, which would have been necessary, but rather, to have her study the life in a grand court. During her stay in Russia, she was a student of the pianist Anton Rubinstein. Sophia and her mother were forced to leave Russia at the outbreak of the Crimean war. After the death of her mother in 1856, Sophia lived with her half-sister, Princess Marie Wilhemine of Wied.