This woman defies explanation at the best of times, but I’ll try based on what I know about her. Someone told me recently that she’s one of the most pure Royals in Spain (even giving old Juan Carlos a run for his money) and has a family tree going back countless centuries. She turns up (often in her surgical stockings) at pretty much every social event in Spain, and manages to look horrific at them all! There was some kind of major controversy early last year when protests were held against her being awarded an honorary title within Andalucía, but I haven’t been able to get a full grip on the details. Maybe one of you will know? Anyway, seeing is believing, so take a look (and a listen indeed, as the voice is real treat too!) – this video is the genuine article:
Dave Hall lives and works in Barcelona. Click here for the entire celeb top 10!
Lesley
9 Feb 07 at 11:33 am
A sort of Spanish Barbara Cartland then? Is the Alba a reference to Scotland? (I’m really, really hoping that it’s not, but that James Stuart in the title makes me think it must be)
Pepino
9 Feb 07 at 11:55 am
I assume there must be a link to the Stuarts of Scotland in years gone by, as these things tend to work this way, but I couldn’t say for sure.
By the way, since I wrote the little report above on the Duquesa, a Spanish friend was telling me that she is SO pure from an aristocratic point of view, that if she were to be in a lift with Queen Elizabeth II, as the doors opened, The Queen would officially have to step back to allow the Duquesa to leave first, due to her “rank”. Whether it’s true, who knows, but I’m sure there is an army of valets and advisors working around the clock to ensure that The Queen and the Duquesa NEVER get into the same lift together! jejejeje
Hernandez Fiendish
9 Feb 07 at 11:55 am
As far as I remember she is a major landowner in Andalucia and the protests were by modern day “jornaleros” over pay/conditions? Something like that.
ValenciaSon
9 Feb 07 at 12:56 pm
Is her appearance due to plastic surgery(ies) or due to her royal purity (shallow gene pool)
.
Enrique
9 Feb 07 at 2:38 pm
Wikipedia’s entry on the House of Alba has a list of all her titles, many of which date from the mid-fifties.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Alba
Graeme
9 Feb 07 at 2:56 pm
I believe its her family that owns the palace just below Conde Duque in Madrid – if you walk past down the Calle Princesa you are hardly aware of it, but there is quite a building hidden behind the trees.
ValenciaSon
9 Feb 07 at 3:25 pm
Do the royals have much say in the government of Spain?
Ben
9 Feb 07 at 4:47 pm
None I believe.
Graeme
9 Feb 07 at 5:26 pm
I guess the test of their power would be whether they could constitutionally refuse to sign a law that abolishes the monarchy. We do not seem to have the right to ask how much money they get from the public purse, a member of parliament who tried to ask the other week had his question rejected.
ValenciaSon
9 Feb 07 at 5:48 pm
Why still have royals then?
Edith
9 Feb 07 at 5:51 pm
LOLOLOL, ValenciaSon, I was thinking exactly the same thing: inbreeding! I have always assumed she was suffering from some kind of disease or genetic defect which might account for her unusual looks and slurred speech. Perhaps someone can shed some light on this?
Graeme
9 Feb 07 at 5:57 pm
Graeme the republican is not going to give you an answer for that question!
Edith
9 Feb 07 at 5:58 pm
P.s.: the LOLOLOL was meant as a comment about royal obsession with bloodlines, not about the condition of the duquesa (whatever it may be).
As far as I’m concerned, the notion of royalty and nobility is at odds with modern concepts of equality and human rights. Nobody should be entitled to special privileges (such as ruling the country or living at the taxpayers’ expense) because of his ancestry. After all, we are talking about a mere accident of birth.
ValenciaSon
9 Feb 07 at 7:12 pm
Graeme, is royalty a touchy subject?
Graeme
9 Feb 07 at 8:14 pm
No, I don’t think so – its just I don’t believe in it so I’m not a very good person to give you reasons for having a monarchy.
Steve
9 Feb 07 at 8:36 pm
I once saw here in Atocha, a friend of mine said that she can actually sit in the House of Lords (or could) but she would have to renounce her Spanish citizenship.
As a royalist I don’t think it is inbreeding I just think she a bit ugly.
titilayo
9 Feb 07 at 8:46 pm
So that’s who she is! I was in Switzerland a while ago and watching some TVE, and I saw them interviewing this rather doddery, strangely-dressed, plastic-surgeried old lady and wondered who on earth she was. They were asking her about some drama involving her children’sromantic lives, I gathered; weird looking as she is, her responses (basically “I don’t get involved, they’re adults and all of that is their business”) were quite sensible.
Pepino
9 Feb 07 at 9:07 pm
I’ve no idea what the financial arrangements of the Spanish Royal family are, but speaking for the British Royals, I don’t think anyone can seriously use the “living at the taxpayers expense” argument, when the UK Royals (the most expensive Royal house in the world, apparently) only cost each UK taxpayer less than £1 a year. They’re an absolute bargain.
Tradition is important. Look at all the festivals in Spain for example. They all stem from some old ritual or other going back years. People, on the whole, need a link to the past or a figurehead to focus some of their attention on (OK, not to worship at all costs like in the past, so please don’t take what I’m saying to those levels). It keeps people steady in times of trouble – a good example being during WWII when King George and Queen were routinely seen picking through the rubble after the Blitz (OK, they probably arrived in a Bentley and then went for tea at the Ritz afterwards, but the point is that the job was done, and for a moment, people with no homes and destroyed lives had something to at least “feel” united behind, and there would be some good come out of the destruction). Would an elected President have the same effect? I think not. He/She would just be weighing up if a timely appearance would boost his/her election chances.
If the Royals were replaced by an elected president, we’d just have the one with the most money and best PR winning each time. Corruption would become the order of the day, with big business paying to support their preferred candidate. The Queen however, is unbribeable given that she has no axe to grind. She doesn’t have one eye on the next round of elections and whether she’ll lose her job. Also, the cost of maintaining a President doesn’t come cheap. I guess The Queen being drapped in jewelry at state events must make people think “Christ, that woman must cost us a fortune!”, whereas a President in a sober suit gives the impression of a bargain maybe?
We have a Prime Minister to handle the political affairs of the country, so why not have a purely ceremonial Head of State to handle the handshaking, waving, and signing of Acts of Parliament, and why not let that person be from a long running family? (I know it’s different in the USA with their combined system of having a “political” President/Head of State)
As for special treatment. It will always exist whether the people on the receiving end are nobility, royalty, or the latest nobody-turned-somebody from Pop Idol. It’s human nature to want to put people on a pedestal (and ocasionally knock them off it again!)
The rules of the game (ie society) are largely set by whoever’s in charge at the time. I don’t mean Conservative v Labour, or Republican v Democrat, but rather by the “class” of the people in charge over the space of decades (if not centuries). In years gone by, when the nobility had real power (and the likes of me had ricketts and were sweeping chimneys 23 hours a day!) a title was something to be admired and respected (or even feared). Nowadays (ie from the end of the First World war onwards), the whole thing has turned on it’s head (class has become a dirty word), and we now have what would traditionally be known as, “working class” people becoming Presidents and Prime Ministers. And if not working class, then “commoners” certainly. (not a bad thing of course). They now set the rules of the game. A noble title is nothing to be automatically respected these days. That’s fine by me, and I fully support personal merit and hardwork being the path to success (so I’m just stating a fact as I see it, and not for a moment suggesting that a title SHOULD be a ticket to fame/public office), but haven’t we all tipped way too far over, and now we’ve gone beyond an educated working class gaining fame/power and instead have a situation where the public generally give their “respect” to whoever’s got the biggest tits on Big Brother! We applaud idiots these days, and people strive to be “the silly one” because they’ve seen huge fame and fortune gained by some brain-dead nobody being unable to string a sentence together on a TV show. (I’m guilty of this too by the way)
I know I must sound like a flag waving, comemorative plate collecting, Union Jack top hat wearing mega-fan of Royalty, and I’m certainly none of those things (never seen The Queen, don’t feel any great need to see her, never even been to London, and have no plans to go), but I do have a level of quiet respect for the institution of Monarchy, and if the person in the “top job” at the time is doing their job well (as The Queen is now), then I’ll have a level of quiet respect for them too.
As for the Duquesa, well, she’s just plain nuts! jejeje
ValenciaSon
9 Feb 07 at 9:15 pm
She looks like a cross between one of the Thunderbirds and Michael Jackson.
Edith
9 Feb 07 at 10:12 pm
Both rednecks and royals are supposed to be the product of inbreeding… some food for thought!
Graeme
9 Feb 07 at 11:06 pm
Well rednecks and royalty are not mutually exclusive, the Queen Mother in Britain was not exactly renowned for her political balance, and Prince Philip has done a good job of maintaining the tradition.
Edith
10 Feb 07 at 1:03 am
Teddy Roosevelt called Queen Wilhelmina of Holland (Queen Beatrix’ grandmother) ‘a peasant woman wearing a crown’.
Wilhelmina was arrogant, incapable of showing any kind of physical love to her children, very matron-like, and devoid of any personal charm.
Barraca
10 Feb 07 at 1:38 am
I think the King has the power to dissolve the cabinet in Spain, so the royals do have some power.
Marina
10 Feb 07 at 1:04 pm
I’ve always heard my mother saying that she was quite beautiful when she was young. However I have to say that I had difficulties in finding good pics of her at that age. You can have a look at an album here: http://www.especialeshf.com/qmd/bio_cayetana/galeria9_5.htm?r=qm
She moves a lot between her house in the Seville and the Palacio de Liria, which as Graeme said is a little bit hidden in the central Calle Princesa (more info about the palace: http://www.spain.info/TourSpain/Arte%20y%20Cultura/Monumentos/N/MH/0/Palacio%20de%20Liria?Language=ES)
That is why she is often seen in Atocha or Sevilla Ave train stations.
As Dave mentioned in number 7 her little daughter was married Francisco Rivera.
One more thing, my grandmother was a “Cigarrera Real”, that is, she use to make cigars by hand for some Dukes. She used to go to deliver her goods in the Palacio de Liria when Cayetana was a child and often saw her riding a Ponny in the garden.
ValenciaSon
10 Feb 07 at 3:06 pm
I hear what you’re saying Pepino but this whole notion of royalty seems so dated. Even at £1 a year, I’m sure there’s a lot better than can be done for the greater good than supporting the royals’ lifestyles. As far as the effect of a people seeing their president roll up his sleeves and digging in, it has a great effect for the morale of the masses, even if sans royalty because people know that it’s a leader leading by example and not a vestigial figurehead. I also like the idea that we won’t have a leader who can become complacent because his/her lineage guarantees that position. As far as activities with other heads of state, who better to do that than our own head of state (except now
) or the vice president or even the Secretary of State. Trust me, when the President comes around, his presence is known and felt by us “commoners” in a similar fashion as when royalty graces commoners with their presence in the UK. Lots of pomp and ceremony and opportunity for nationalistic fervor for those who bend that way. I don’t mean to judge a different culture by the norms of my own and if I’ve offended, I apologize.
Carl
10 Feb 07 at 5:54 pm
ValenciaSon, you are a nice man and very diplomatic! I agree with you. It seems that Pepino is very taken with the royals of the UK and elsewhere. There are many people who would argue with him regarding their relevance. Any “Republicano” in Spain will gladly talk his ear off. However, I do have a soft spot for Spanish royalty due to their low key nature and since Juan Carlos actually did something very important when Franco died.
If anybody was offensive – Pepino should realize that elected presidents / prime ministers are looked up to and respected – but they have to earn it… Of course elected officials are human and sometimes it doesn’t always work out great – but we must keep trying!
And as far as the queen being “unbribable”, If that is true it is only because she has no power or influence. Corruption is possible with ANY person with power.
And I didn’t quite understand your point, Pepino, on “commoners becoming presidents and prime ministers”. I think most people would agree that that is a good thing. The class system, as I understand it in the UK, really kept “commoners” in their place for centuries. A modern democracy is not supposed to do that.
Edith
10 Feb 07 at 8:26 pm
Hi Pepino,
For some reason I didn’t see your post until today!
Yes, I really do believe a mere accident of birth does not entitle people to any special privileges. This means I judge í§ommoners’ and ‘noblemen’ by the same standards, i.e. by their actions. For instance, I had a soft spot for Claus von Amsberg (the late husband of our Queen Beatrix); not because he was a prince but because of what he did for Africa. I really felt sad when he died in 2002, he was one of the nicest members of our royal family. It’s the notion of nobility I have got a problem with, not the people: they are just mere humans like the rest of us, and if they use their position to promote worthy causes such as aid for Africa that’s fine with me. But any celebrity can do the same.
I agree 100% with your observations about the way in which a Don Nadie can be come an instant celeb just by taking part in some ridiculous media event. That is just so to the point, and it’s one of my pet peeves too! Instead of applauding these idiots, why not focus on people who have really done something to make this world a better place to live in, or whose role has been educational. One of my heroes from the last category is David Attenborough because this man has done such a huge lot to get people interested in wildlife. And of course there are many other examples. I don’t give a toss about glitter & glamour because I find people like Nelson Mandela and the Dalai Lama to be far more interesting!
Pepino
11 Feb 07 at 9:40 pm
Hello again,
Thanks for the replies to my monster-sized post. Why do these posts always look so huge on screen, but only take what seems like 5 minutes to write? jeje
First of all, this business of being offended/offensive… I don’t see what anyone has said that could possibly be offensive in any way. Has anyone been offended by my post?? Blimey, you’d have to be a sensitive soul to feel offended by someone just stating that, for them, the current system in the UK is better than an elected Head of State (even though that alternative system might work perfectly well in other countries where it’s well established). It’s an issue that polarises people’s opinions of course, but an issue where no one is right and no one is wrong. One of the many reasons I use this website so much is that the comments rarely (if ever) offend, and people can give opinions that differ from another’s without anyone jumping down their throat, so the last thing I want is to go down that road with one of my own posts.
Carl – I think you might have misread that comment that confused you about commoners becoming leaders. What I was saying is that it IS a good thing. The words I used were “not a bad thing of course”. I hope no-one thinks I’m advocating a return to Masters and Servants!
Reading my post to myself again, I think it’s more of less clear that I’m just giving an opinion on how I view Royalty, and I figured that when an institution is as old as that, you really can only understand it properly if you set it in the context of the past, and mention where it has come from, and how it has changed etc. Most of those changes have been to the huge benefit of the people at large, so that’s something I’m grateful for.
As for the dumbing down of fame by idiots, I have to say that I’m very much part of the problem there, despite the fact it drives me crazy. I watch some of these shows (well, I used to always watch Big Brother without fail when I lived in the UK) and I’ve gasped in horror at the stupidity on show and wished it would all end, but I haven’t reached for the “off” button so I only have myself to blame. I’m just glad that none of these people are members of my family!
I totally agree with Edith about David Attenborough. He’s a hero of mine, and his involvement in a nature program pretty much guarantees that I’ll be glued to the TV.
Finally, Marina’s pics of the Duquesa when young are a real eye-opener. Where did it all go so wrong?? jeje
ValenciaSon
12 Feb 07 at 1:21 pm
I just looked at the pictures of a younger Alba from Marina’s URLs and she was quite beautiful when she was young. It’s amazing how people change.
Edith
12 Feb 07 at 5:31 pm
True, the contrast is enormous and I admit she keeps intrigueing me.
Remember Victor Yushenko, the politician from Ukraine whose facial features changed radically in a matter of weeks after having been poisoned? I mean, the duquesa’s face almost looks malformed and not merely old, especially if you compare her to the pictures from Marina’s URL. And then there’s her slurred speech. Perhaps she has had a stroke? Could a stroke do that to a human face?
Pepino
12 Feb 07 at 6:24 pm
She’s very wobbly on her feet and often has someone help her along, so maybe she has had some kind of stroke (or that part could just be down to her age). I’ll try to find out. In the meantime, does anyone else know?
But her face is so tight that it really has the look of too much surgery about it.
ValenciaSon
12 Feb 07 at 10:08 pm
she could be parkinsonian
Riviera
28 Sep 09 at 12:39 am
The protests were over the concession of the title of “Hija predilecta de Andalucia” to the Duquesa. In Andalucia, for the past ~30 years we have had a so-called socialist government. The fact that a (again, in name) socialist government would grant the most prestigious recognition to a massive landowner who never did anything for Andalucia and whose power stems only from her birth luck is outrageous, to say the least. In a healthily critical society this government wouldn’t have lasted much after this. But I guess that, ironically, 30 years in power are enough to turn the most radical socialist into a sort of aristocrat wannabe. And dog don’t eat dog.