Why don't we know the last names of the British royals before the Windsors. Have they ALL been Windsors?

Question

Why don't we know the last names of the British royals before the Windsors. Have they ALL been Windsors?

Answer 1

THey changed their name to Windsor to disguise their German blood, as after WW2, it would have created bad blood in England to have a German monarchy. If you google the royal family tree, you will see their surnames, like Mountbatten, Saxe Coburg, Tudor, Stuart etc.

Answer 2

Windsor is a modern fiction made up during the war to gloss over the royal family's Germanic background. Henry VIII was a Tudor. Some were Stuart. There have been a number of different families on the throne.

But there is little reason for Royals to have surnames because of their position in society. If I said, 'Look, there's Elizabeth Windsor', most people would think I'm referring to a neighbour or someone I work with. But if I said, 'Look, there's The Queen,' you know who she is and what she looks like. Having the surname isn't the same for them.

Answer 3

Actually, the Windsor line began with Queen Elizabeth and it will die with her ( Charles has adopted the Windsor-Mountbatten family name)

Lots of different family names - the Tidors, the Plantagenets are some that come to mind.

Answer 4

What do you why we don't know all of the "last names"? We do! And royals use ROYAL HOUSE NAMES more than surnames.Surnames were not always in existence.

The Windsors were also known as the Saxe-Coburg-Gothas.

Before the Windsors there were the Hanoverians and Stuarts. And before these,there were the Tudors.Visit http://www.royal.gov/uk/output/Page5.asp

And the name Windsor is not fiction as some posters have responded.The family chose to use the names of one of their palaces as their surname. Remember that I wrote that Windsor was originally Saxe-Coburg-Gotha? In 1917,World War I was active. London was bombed by 24 twin-engined GOTHA war planes.The King was attacked by his own German relatives! He was miffed;so was the rest of England. The King decided to drop the Royal House Name of his German ancestors and use his palace name of Windsor as the family's surname and Royal House Name.

The Mountbattens,Philip's family,who were also royals first started life as Schlesweig-Holstein-Sonderburg-

Glucksburgs(a DANISH Royal House--they also had German relatives who took over some of their lands as well).They first decided to use Battenberg,but after their pesky German relatives(Queen Victoria's dream that her extended family could rule a peaceful Europe was not to be) bombed England,they anglicized Battenberg to Mountbatten.

Answer 5

I don't know where you've got that idea from: we *do* know past surnames of the Royal Family.  There is documentation of names and activities of all members of our Royal Family streching back over many hundreds of years.  The Tudors are an obvious example of a "house" who were known by their surname.  The Georgians and the Edwardians were known by the multiple monarchs bearing the same first name, rather than surname.  They often didn't have surnames in the manner that we do because they were "of" something instead; or because they were simply known by their first and middle name (e.g. George I was George Louis, or even George Ludwig, as he was born in Germany).

The Windsors aren't even the Windsors; it's a fake name that was given to them during the Second World War because their real family name is German, since that's where the line comes from.  Queen Victoria married Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, and the "house" name (as in "House of Windsor") was Wettin.  This was then changed to Windsor for the sake of appearances.  Elizabeth's family also bear the surname Mountbatten which was an anglicised version of Battenberg (again German).  Prince Philip's "surname" would have been Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg- Glucksburg but he adopted Windsor when he married Queen Elizabeth.

So in conclusion, no: they haven't all been Windsors, and those who have been known as such, still technically aren't!  Just because previous monarchs may not have had a surname does not mean that they are automatically Windors just because that is the name of the current queen.  Some people are too fabulous to need surnames: like Madonna and Cher :D  The Royal Family is just the same!!!