Bavaria turns back clock for royal wedding in Munich
May 20, 2023
Ludwig Prince of Bavaria, great-great-grandson of the last Bavarian King Ludwig III, held a public wedding ceremony with his bride, Sophie-Alexandra Evekink, who was born in 1989 to a Dutch-Canadian family, in Munich on Saturday.
Legally, the couple were already married, having held a private ceremony in December.
Traditional Bavaria goes back to its roots
Ludwig is a representative of the House of Wittelsbach, which ruled Bavaria until the end of the monarchy in 1918.
The wedding ceremony was performed in the Theatine Church by the Archbishop of Munich, Cardinal Reinhard Marx.
The church itself has royal connections, having been commissioned and built to honor the long-awaited birth of a male heir to Bavaria's crown in the second half of the 17th century.
Even the transportation had a classic Bavarian feel to it, as the couple was chauffeured away in a 1950s prototype BMW 505 Pullman limousine, which never went into mass production.
It was designed originally as a potential alternative to then-Chancellor Konrad Adenauer's Mercedes government limo, but the first post-war chancellor ultimately chose to stick with Mercedes, purportedly because he caught his hat on the roof edge when exiting the vehicle after a test ride.
Brief faint adds a shock to ceremony, but Ludwig didn't drop the ball
Soon after saying "I do" (or, strictly speaking, after saying "yes" in a German ceremony), according to some of the roughly 1,000 guests, Sophie-Alexandra briefly appeared to faint and fall backward.
German mass-circulation daily Bild, which is often more than happy to pick up on royal news from anywhere on the planet, cited a "godfather" from the ceremony as saying: "The bride fell backwards, but the bridegroom caught her. The groomsmen also rushed to help. We're pleased that soon after she appeared absolutely fine again."
According to the accounts, after some glucose and a sip of cola, the bride was quickly back on her feet.
Bild described Saturday's ceremony as "the biggest German royal event of the year" and the couple as "the German William and Kate," in reference to the Prince and Princess of Wales.
The 40-year-old groom appeared early in the morning with his mother Beatrix, in a classic cutaway. His father, Luitpold von Bayern, accompanied the bride's mother, Veronica Taylor.
The bride, who is a criminology PhD student in Oxford, arrived just before the wedding ceremony, in a white classical dress. The long, delicate bridal veil was attached to the bride's head with a tiara.
The filigree piece was created by a Ukrainian designer who also incorporated hidden Canadian and Dutch details.
Archbishop Marx greeted the bride on Odeonsplatz, the square where the Theatine Church is situated. Then the bride moved into the baroque building alongside her father Dorus Evekink, while the bells rang festively.
Approximately 1,000 guests were present in the church, including representatives of well-known aristocratic houses such as Esterhazy, Habsburg, Saxe-Coburg, Fugger and Liechtenstein.
Politicians like Bavarian Premier Markus Söderwere also among the guests. The wedding continued a "beautiful tradition," said Söder. It was "a nice day for all of us," he added.
dh/msh (dpa, Reuters)