Crown Princess Victoria, (Victoria Ingrid Alice Desirée Bernadotte, born July 14, 1977), Duchess of Västergötland, is the royal heir apparent of Sweden. She is the first-born child and heir of King Carl XVI Gustav of Sweden and Queen Silvia. She was born a Royal Princess, however constitutional reform, reportedly enacted over the objections of her father, created her Crown Princess and heir apparent on January 1, 1980. She is a descendant of Napoleon's marshall Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, who was adopted by the childless Swedish king Charles XIII and made his heir, and of Napoleon's former lover, Desirée Clary, who married Bernadotte. She is also a direct descendant of Napoleon's wife, Joséphine de Beauharnais, whose granddaughter married the Bernadottes' son, King Oscar I of Sweden.
The old principle of agnatic primogeniture, which meant that the throne was inherited by the eldest male child of the preceding monarch, was replaced by the principle of full cognatic primogeniture. This meant that the throne would be inherited by the eldest child without regard to sex, and Sweden was the first country to adopt it. King Carl XVI Gustav himself, born in 1946, had been a fifth child, with four older sisters.
As a princess, and as heir to the throne, Victoria is prohibited by the Swedish constitution from becoming the regent and head of another state, either by election, succession or marriage, unless approval is granted by the King and the Parliament, by forfeit of all rights of succession for herself and her heirs. The Bernadotte monarch has alone and ex-constitutionally had the right to exclude members of the Royal House from the rights of succession, commonly caused by disapproval of marriage.
Victoria's namesday on March 12 and her birthday on July 14 are official flag days in Sweden.
See also: Constitution of Sweden, Politics of Sweden
