Remains of last Russian czar's heir may have been found

International Herald Tribune ^ | August 23, 2007

[3AngelaD]

MOSCOW: Prosecutors announced Friday that they have reopened an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the deaths of the last Russian czar and his family nearly 90 years ago after an archaeologist said the remains of the czar's son and heir to the throne at last may have been found.

The announcement of the reopened investigation, while a routine matter, signaled that government may be taking the claims — announced Thursday by Yekaterinburg researcher Sergei Pogorelov — seriously.

In comments broadcast on NTV, Pogorelov said bones found in a burned area of ground near Yekaterinburg belong to a boy and a young woman roughly the ages of Czar Nicholas II's 13-year-old son, Alexei, and a daughter whose remains also never have been found.

Yekaterinburg is the Urals Mountain city where the czar, his wife and children were held prisoner and then shot in 1918. If confirmed, the find would solve a persistent mystery and fill in a missing chapter in the story of the doomed family, victims of the violent 1917 Bolshevik Revolution that ushered in more than 70 years of communist rule.

The find comes almost a decade after remains identified as those of Nicholas, his wife and three of their daughters were reburied in a ceremony in the imperial-era capital of St. Petersburg. The ceremony, however, was shadowed by statements of doubt — including from within the Russian Orthodox Church — about their authenticity.

On Friday, a church official voiced what appeared to skepticism about the find...

The spot where the remains were found appears to correspond to a site described in writing by Yakov Yurovsky, the leader of the family's killers, said Pogorelov, an archaeologist at a regional center for the preservation of historical and cultural monuments in Yekaterinburg...

[Niuhuru]

“Bourbon, Orleans and Napoleonic contenders.”

I would have to say the Valois have a much more ancient claim and thus more legitimate. Then the Bourbons. The Orleanist branch were a bunch of monarchist backstabbers and the Napoleonic pretenders are just that...pretenders.

Napoleon never had any royal blood, he was just a Corsican peasant who became a general, who was then coronated after the fickle French decided they wanted a ruler who wasn’t part of the messy and incompetent Directory. After Napoleon was exiled on Elba the Bonapartes should have renounced all claims and lived discreetly.

Of all, if I were to select anyone, I would have selected the Head of the House of Valois, or the Head of the House of Bourbon. They have the best claim at at each time the House ruled.

If neither were decent enough, then the House of Capet should be chosen. They were the first French monarchists before the Valois.

[SunkenCiv]

Note: this topic is from 8/24/2007. Thanks 3AngelaD.

[Yollopoliuhqui]

All this hand wringing over the execution of the Czar and his immediate family is an exercise in fascist nostalgia. From what I’ve read of history, the Nicholas II was as much an airhead as Obama. He was murdered why? because his subjects were happy, contented workers living fulfilling lives under a benevolent monarch?! As a Republican, I find monarchy a hideous concept that needs to be wiped off the face of the Earth. I have no sympathy for monarchs, oligarchs, royalty, aristocracy, plutocracy or kleptocracy. European history is one long tale of discontent, rebellion and hatred for the tyrannical excesses of the nobility. Frankly, the Czar got what he deserved. Had his assassins been religious mystics, lone nuts or midget circus clowns, I’d raise my flagon to them with a “well done”.