



Within her family, she was known as "Minnie" throughout her life. Most of her adult life, however, she was known as Maria Feodorovna, the name which she took when she converted to Orthodoxy immediately before her 1866 marriage to the future Emperor Alexander III. Growing up, she was known by the name Dagmar. She was baptised as a Lutheran in the Yellow Palace with Queen Caroline Amalie of Denmark as her Godmother, and named after her kinswoman Marie Sophie Frederikke of Hesse-Kassel, Queen Dowager of Denmark, as well as the popular medieval Danish queen, Dagmar of Bohemia, in accordance with the national romantic fashion of the time. She was the fourth child and second daughter of the then Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, a member of a princely cadet line, and his wife Princess Louise of Hesse-Kassel. Princess Marie Sophie Frederikke Dagmar was born on 26 November 1847 at her parents' residence in the Yellow Mansion, an 18th-century town house at 18 Amaliegade, which is located immediately adjacent to the Amalienborg Palace complex, the principal residence of the Danish royal family in the district of Frederiksstaden in central Copenhagen. Princess Dagmar's birthplace and childhood home, the Yellow Mansion in Copenhagen. She also possessed that priceless royal gift of never forgetting a face or name." Early life minister to Russia, said that she was "graceful, with a most kindly face and manner" and that she was "in every way cordial and kindly." Nadine Wonar-Larsky, her lady-in-waiting, noted that "her smile cheered everyone and her gracious manner always suggested a touch of personal feeling which went straight to the hearts of her subjects. I like her, and I am neither emperor nor any other Russian, and never exchanged a thousand words with her in my life." Maria von Bock, the daughter of Pyotr Stolypin, wrote, "kind, amiable, simple in her discourse, Maria Fedorovna was an Empress from head to toe, combining an inborn majesty with such goodness that she was idolized by all who knew her." Meriel Buchanan wrote that she possessed a "gracious and delightful charm of manner." Andrew Dickson White, the U.S. Knox wrote, "No wonder the emperor likes her, and no wonder the Russians like her. He said, "Bring to me any woman in Europe- queen, artiste, or bourgeoise- who can inspire me as does Madame Her Majesty, and I will make her confections while I live and charge her nothing." ĭagmar was very charming and likable. John Logan, a visitor to Russia, described her as "the best dressed woman in Europe." He claimed that Empress Elisabeth of Austria "excelled her in beauty" but that "no one touched" her "in frocks." Charles Frederick Worth, a Parisian couturier, greatly admired her style.
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She told an American minister to Russia that "the Russian language is full of power and beauty, it equals the Italian in music, the English in vigorous power and copiousness." She claimed that "for compactness of expression," Russian rivaled "Latin, and for the making of new words is equal to the Greek." ĭagmar was very fashionable. However, within a few years, she mastered the language and was so proficient that her husband wrote to her in Russian.
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she is a very nice girl." When she married, she didn't know how to speak any Russian. When considering Dagmar for her second son Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Queen Victoria judged that "Dagmar is cleverer. He wrote that Dagmar was "less inclined to stoutness than the bride, she does not display such a plumpness of shoulder, and her neck rises more swan-like and gives fuller play to her finely formed head, with its curly hair and Grecian outline of face." He also commented favorably on "her keen, clear, and flashing eyes." ĭagmar was intelligent. Knox met her at Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich of Russia's wedding and wrote favorably about her beauty compared to that of the bride, Duchess Marie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. Her eyes speak for her: they are so kind, intelligent, animated." When she was tsarevna, Thomas W. He wrote to his mother that "she is even prettier in real life than in the portraits that we had seen so far. Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge said that Dagmar was "sweetly pretty" and commented favorably on her "splendid dark eyes." Her fiancee Tsarevich Nicholas Alexandrovich was enthusiastic about her beauty. Tsesarevna Maria Feodorovna of Russia, 1870sĭagmar was known for her beauty.
