The Kingdom of Bulgaria existed from 1908 until 1946. The kingdom operated under Salic law, which did not allow for the succession of women. The Queens mentioned are, therefore, consorts and not reigning Queens. Any claimed titles since the end of the kingdom are titular.
The last King of Bulgaria was King Simeon II, who was just six years old when his father died on 28 August 1943. His parents were Boris III of Bulgaria and Giovanna of Italy. His uncle, Prince Kiril, Prime Minister Bogdan Filov, and Lt. General Nikola Mihov were appointed as regents for the young King. In September 1944, the three regents were deposed during a coup. They were executed the following year. Three new regents from the communist regime were appointed while Simeon, his mother and sister Marie Louise remained at the palace in Sofia.
In September 1946, a referendum was held about abolishing the monarchy and declaring a republic. Officially, over 95% voted for the abolishment of the monarchy. The following day, the royal family was exiled from Bulgaria. Simeon still holds the claim to the throne. He even managed to return to Bulgaria and was its Prime Minister from 2001 to 2005.
Simeon married a Spanish aristocrat, Doña Margarita Gómez-Acebo y Cejuela, on 21 January 1962. Margarita would thus be Queen of Bulgaria today. They went on to have five children together, four sons and one daughter.
Margarita was born on 6 January 1935 as the daughter of Manuel Gómez-Acebo y Modet, 4th Marquess of Cortina and María de las Mercedes Cejuela y Fernández. She had an elder brother, José Luis, who died in 2010. Her parents and maternal grandmother were executed in 1936 by the Communists during the Spanish Civil War. She and her brother were then taken in by a close friend of their father’s and later by their paternal grandmother, until she died in 1940. Later, they were cared for by their paternal uncles, Don Juan Gómez-Acebo y Modet and Don Jaime Gómez-Acebo y Modet.
Margarita and her husband currently live in Vrana Palace in Sofia, which was returned to them by Bulgaria’s Constitutional Court.
Their eldest son, Kardam, should have followed in his father’s claim upon his eventual death, but tragically, Kardam was in a car accident in 2008. He died of his injuries following many years of being in a coma in 2015. He had two sons with his wife, Miriam, who remarried Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad of Jordan in 2022. Their eldest son, Boris, is not yet married.
The death of King Boris, engineered by Hitler, was terrible. Mary ouise lives in a town near me and has just lost her husband. Simeon went to Valley Forge Military academy and he and his family were known to other students and theie families. A hard row for the family of King Ferdinand, a cousin to Qu Victoria. Uneasy lies the head….