Queen Mary of Romania

(1875 England- 1938 Romania)

Queen Maria (Marie Alexandra Victoria de Saxa-Coburg şi Gotha) was the crown
princess and the second queen of Romania, and the wife of the crown prince who later became
King Ferdinand I of Romania. She was the mother of King Carol II.

She married on December 29, 1892 with Ferdinand I, the prince of the throne of
Romania, trying from the very beginning and succeeding to integrate with the nation that had
adopted her as a princess and, since 1914, as a queen.

She has constantly pursued the strengthening of the ties between Romania and the UK,
proving real diplomatic qualities in supporting and defending the interests of Romania. She
opposed Romania's entry into World War I on behalf of the Central Powers and supported the
alliance with the Entente in order to support the achievement of the Romanian national state.

During the war, she accompanied her husband in his refuge in Moldova, working as a
charity sister in the military hospitals, an activity that made her to be known as "the mother of
the wounded".

During the Peace Conference in Paris (1919) and after the crowning, along with King
Ferdinand, as rulers of Great Romania (Alba Iulia, October 15, 1922), she participated in a
diplomatic campaign for the international recognition of the reunited Romanian state, having
official or informal meetings with the English sovereign, with the President of the United States
of America, Woodrow Wilson, with the French President Georges Clemenceau, or with the
European media representatives.

After King Ferdinand's death and the arrival of his son, Carol II (1930) who succeeded in
removing Queen Maria from political life, forced her to live in a kind of domestic exile at her
residences Balchik and Bran.
 Queen Elisabeth of Romania

(1843 Germany – 1916 Romania)

Queen Elisabeta (Elisabeth Pauline Ottilie Luise zu Wied) was the Queen of Romania
during the reign of her husband Carol I of Romania. She was matron of the Arts, founder of
some charitable institutions, poet, essayist and writer.

In 1869 Princess Elizabeth of Wied married Prince Carol I of Romania, becoming in 1881
the first queen of Romania, following the recognition of the country as a kingdom by both the
Ottoman Gate and the great European Powers after the War of Independence of Romania in
1877.

During the 1877 war, Elisabeth set up hospitals, ambulance and care services, and
purchased pills for the wounded.

Queen Elizabeth has been energetically involved in supporting the arts and
philanthropic society, through which she encouraged high society ladies to play an active role in
fundraising and charitable management.

The Queen also had the initiative to identify the potential of Romanian crafts. She
herself was often wearing the Romanian national clothes, considered until then the peasants'
clothing, and encouraged the ladies in her suite to do the same, giving clothes a special social
value.

She encouraged talented young people to study through a scholarship program.

Elisabeth was aware of the major benefit of tourism in a country that was not yet in the
international tourist circuit. She has initiated an advertising campaign in this field to make her
adoptive country known abroad. The Orient Express train was stoping at Sinaia and travelers
were housed at the royal castle.

As part of the same campaign, Romania participated in the Universal Exhibition in Paris
in 1867, 1889 and 1900 with many articles traditionally made by women such as embroidery
and upholstery, and in 1912 the Queen organized the “Die Frau im Kunst und Beruf” (The
Woman in Art and Crafts).

Her exquisite linguistic talent helped her to publish various works in French, German
and English under the pseudonym Carmen Sylva, through her works making Romania known
abroad; thus she attracted the attention of Pierre Loti and Mark Twain, who, remembering her,
they wrote: "That lovely and adorable German princess and German poet that recalls the
flowers of the forests and the plains."

Queen Elizabeth died shortly before Romania declared war to Germany.