Vintage photos of the Romanovs at the 1903 Costume Ball | Hacker News Reader

Vintage photos of the Romanovs at the 1903 Costume Ball

thevintagenews.com

44 pointsdsnr14 comments

I'm a descendent of Princess Kudasheva (scroll down)

She was the granddaughter of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Trepov - last prime minister under the czar - just before Kerensky.

She died of the Spanish Flu in 1918.

The princess's daughter (my grandmother) married Norman Armour

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Armour

Pretty cool! I notice that Kudasheva herself doesn't have a wiki page - care to start one?

The idea that the adversarial removal of royal legitimacy calls for the execution of all the children of the royals sets me reeling. I think the idea was offensive at the time as well, since the clumsy and brutal killings of all but the tsar were covered up.

Some of the people in the article survived the era. One notably died in Manhattan 1993 after settling down in the US and marrying a woman from Buffalo.

Crowns that slip become nooses. It's not right, but it's the predictable outcome of inherited power.

Right. The idea of killing the children also sends me reeling, but I can see the thinking: if any heirs are allowed to live, there could be a movement to re-establish the royalty. Killing them nips that in the bud and makes whatever revolution feel a little more "permanent". Still... awful and tragic.

Killing the kids was standard practice for inter and intra royalty spats, presumably for similar reasons.

See: The Princes in the Tower

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princes_in_the_Tower

Now we know where they got princess Padmé Amidala's costume ideas from.. particularly Grand Duchess Ksenia Alexandrovna

I’m sure they got ideas from multiple places, one of the most notable is a photo of a Mongolian noble often (incorrectly?) named as Queen Genepil.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genepil#/media/File%3AMongol...

Well, that's definitely the craziest head gear I've ever seen.

That Baroness actually looks like Natalie Portman.

Great headdresses on the ladies.

Now those are COSTUMES. I need to rethink my Halloween plans.

The women's faces are are all so ... samey?

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