August 03, 2003

The Swedish Royal Family is French...
I'm not joking. Back in the early 1800's, the Swedish nobility was plagued with in-fighting, so the Riksdag (parliament) decided to put a foreigner on the Swedish throne. They admired the French army so much that they decided to elect Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte (born in 1763 in Pau, France) as crown prince of Sweden in 1810.
Bernadotte was a general and diplomat for Napoleon. However, once in Sweden, he did not follow pro-French policy. Instead, he joined a coalition against Napoleon, and in 1813, his allied army gave Napoleon his first major defeat. Bernadotte became king Karl XIV Johan of Sweden in 1818. His descendant, Carl XVI Gustaf, became king of Sweden in 1973.
You can check out the Swedish royal line, and the Swedish royal family online.

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