She has one older brother: Ralf Sommerlath (born 1929). Her other brothers were Walther Sommerlath, who died in 2020, and Jörg Sommerlath, who died in 2006. The Mother-Child House Jörg Sommerlath in Berlin, operated by Queen Silvia's World Childhood Foundation,[3] is named after her brother.[citation needed]
She attended grammar school in
Düsseldorf, finishing her Abitur in 1963; and attended the Munich School of Interpreting from 1965 to 1969, majoring in
Spanish.[1]
During the
1972 Summer Olympics, Silvia Sommerlath met Crown Prince Carl Gustaf. At the time, she was leading a marketing campaign for the city of
Munich. Sommerlath and the other Olympic hostesses wore sky-blue
dirndls to promote Bavarian cultural identity.[5][6][7][8] After the death of King
Gustaf VI Adolf on 15 September 1973, Carl XVI Gustaf succeeded to the throne.
He and Silvia announced their engagement on 12 March 1976 and were married three months later, on 19 June 1976 in
Stockholm Cathedral ("
Storkyrkan Cathedral") in
Stockholm.[9] It was the first marriage of a reigning Swedish monarch since 1797. The wedding was preceded, the evening before, by a Royal Variety Performance, where the Swedish musical group
ABBA performed "
Dancing Queen" for the very first time, as a tribute to Sweden's future queen.[10]
The King and Queen of Sweden have three children and eight grandchildren:
In February 2021, Silvia was taken to hospital after she fractured her right wrist in a fall.[11]
Father's Nazi links
In July 2002, the Queen became the subject of international curiosity when an article published in the
syndicalist newspaper Arbetaren reported that German state archives record that the Queen's father,
Walther Sommerlath, joined the Nazi party's foreign wing, the
NSDAP/AO, in 1934, when he was living in
Brazil and working for a German steel company.[12] In December 2010, Queen Silvia wrote a letter of complaint to
Jan Scherman, the CEO of
TV4, the network that had aired a documentary about her father's alleged Nazi past.[13]
Queen Silvia commissioned a report from World War II expert Erik Norberg, a choice that was criticised due to Norberg having ties to the royal family. In his report, Norberg argued that the Queen's father had in fact helped the owner of the steel-fabrication plant, a Jewish businessperson, escape from Germany by taking over the factory.[14] In a December 2011 interview for Sweden's
public service broadcaster
Sveriges Television, Silvia called the media's handling of the information about her father "
character assassination".[15]
She was also a co-founder of the
World Childhood Foundation in 1999, having been inspired by her work as Patron of the first World Congress against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children held in Stockholm.[17] She has also been involved in the
Global Child Forum, which she helped initiate, as a keynote speaker in several forums.[18][19]
Her commitment to the work with
dementia and the care of the elderly at the end of life is also well known and respected. On her initiative, Silviahemmet was established in Stockholm. It works to educate hospital personnel in how to work with people suffering from dementia, and also initiates research in the area.[20]
She chairs the Royal Wedding Fund, which supports research in sports and athletics for disabled young people[21] and the Queen Silvia Jubilee Fund for research on children and disability.[21]
Queen Silvia holds honorary positions in the Swedish Amateur Athletic Association, the Children's Cancer Foundation of Sweden and
Save the Children Sweden.[21]
^Swedish Royal websiteArchived 23 May 2013 at the
Wayback Machine, kungahuset.se; accessed 7 April 2016. (in Swedish) State visit of Grand-Dukes of Luxembourg in Sweden, gala dinner (15 April 2008)
^Portuguese Presidency Website, Orders
search formArchived 17 January 2013 at the
Wayback Machine : type "RAINHA SÍLVIA" in "nome", then click "Pesquisar"
^Portuguese Presidency, King Carl XVI receives the Grand Collar of the Order of Saint James of the Sword and Queen Silvia receives the Grand Cross of the Order of Prince Henry :
Photo.