Grand Duke married Georgi Romanov, 40, and Rebecca Petarini, 39, of Italy. The ceremony took place at St. Isaac’s Cathedral in the center of the ancient imperial capital.
According to the AFP photographer at the scene, each of the prospective spouses held a candle in their hand and wore it in front of the Orthodox priests in gold.
Sarin’s heir, with a thin gray beard and confident look, appeared in a black dress and yellow jacket. His bride wore a long white dress embroidered with gold thread bearing the coat of arms of the Russian Empire.
According to Orthodox tradition, two garlands were held briefly over their heads. Many young women in traditional Russian attire wore the tail of the bride’s dress, which was embroidered with a tsarist coat of arms.
According to the organizers, 1,500 people were invited, including Queen Sofia of Spain, deposed Simeone II of Bulgaria and his wife Margarita, Princess Lee of Belgium and other representatives of the European royal family.
Luxembourg’s Prime Minister Xavier Petal and her husband Giorgio Dostone and Russian embassy spokeswoman Maria Zakharova are invited.
Among the guests, some wore fur, while others were dressed in Cossack uniforms and pendants. Before the religious ceremony, a civil wedding took place in Moscow last week.
Vladimir Putin’s spokesman told reporters that the Russian president “did not plan to greet the newlyweds.” “This marriage is in no way connected with our agenda,” said Dmitry Peskov.
Galina Poprova, who lives in St. Petersburg, watched the arrival of the first guests in front of St. Isaac’s Cathedral on Friday morning with dozens of journalists there.
“I wish them happiness. Of course, the monarchy is part of our past, but it’s interesting,” he told the AFP.
The last marriage of Romanov’s heirs to Russia was the marriage of Tsar Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra 127 years ago.
“History of Russia”
Guerrero Romanov, born in Madrid and graduated from Oxford, is the son of Grand Duchess Maria Romanova, granddaughter of Grand Duke Grill.
The latter was a cousin of Nicholas II, the last Tsar of the Romanov dynasty, who ruled Russia for more than 300 years until the February 1917 revolution.
The king was captured by the Bolsheviks, and a year later, in the Urals, he shot his wife, Empress Alexandra, along with their four daughters and their son.
Their bodies and the bodies of their children were transferred to Peter and Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg in 1998, after being buried in a place that had long been kept secret by Soviet authorities.
They were canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church in 2000 and officially recognized by the courts in 2008 as victims of Bolshevism.
Grand Duke Georgi Romanov, who spent most of his life in France, like many former members of the Russian royal family, met his fiance in Brussels, where they worked together for European companies.
According to him, Rebecca Petarini, the daughter of a diplomat, converted to Orthodoxy and was renamed Victoria Romanovna.
Grand Duke, who has been based in Moscow for three years near the Kremlin, says he dedicates himself to charitable projects.
In an interview with Russian media outlet Fontanga on Wednesday, he explained that he chose to get married in St. Petersburg “for a lot of reasons”: the city, “the history of Russia, the history of the Romanov house”.
“Music geek. Coffee lover. Devoted food scholar. Web buff. Passionate internet guru.”
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