The world has just turned a page in history.
Queen Elizabeth II died on September 8 at the age of 96, after a reign that lasted more than seven decades.
The longest on record within the British Royal Family.
Since the death of prince Philip in April 2021, the fragile health of the sovereign never ceased to concern the British.
She left surrounded by her family in her castle in Balmoral, Scotland.
To discover
Trips to Greece: tailor-made tours, hotels and stays from our partners
Figaro stay in Greece |
6 days |
The Athenian Days
His disappearance created a shock wave.
Because Elizabeth II was a diplomatic weapon for the United Kingdom, exercising her discreet - but certain - influence on the world.
A true globe-trotting queen, she completed the equivalent of 42 times around the Earth (more than 110 countries traveled), before stopping her travels in 2015, at the age of 89.
However, there are certain territories on which Elizabeth II never set foot during her reign, like … Greece.
Read alsoElizabeth II, queen and globetrotter
An absence related to her husband
Amazing?
Not really.
Indeed, Elizabeth II's husband, Prince Philip, had a complicated history with the country in which he was born in 1921. In September 1922, in the midst of the Greco-Turkish war, her uncle, King Constantine I of Greece, is forced to abdicate, putting the entire monarchy in an uncertain situation.
Prince Andrew of Greece, father of Philip, finds himself banished from the country.
He must flee with his family aboard a British ship to reach France.
Proof of the frugality of the trip: the husband of Elizabeth II, then a baby, sleeps in a cot made from a crate of oranges.
A painful episode that will forever mark the Duke of Edinburgh.
Because the fall of the monarchy, the dictatorship of the colonels, the tensions between the Greek royal family and the government will prevent him - and in fact Elizabeth II - from making official visits to Greece.
However, the royal couple has already been there in all discretion before the sovereign acceded to the throne in 1952. A trip that she will not repeat thereafter.
And Greece is not the only territory to have suffered the disaffection of Elizabeth II.
Because of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, on which she never wanted to take sides (the sacrosanct rule of neutrality obliges), the queen never went to Israel during her reign.
His grandson, Prince William will still visit the country in 2018. Same rule for Cuba, marked in particular by its missile crisis in 1962, or Argentina, against which the United Kingdom opposed in the Falklands War in 1982. The Philippines, Albania or even Montenegro will not have had the honor of a royal visit either.