For the longest time now I thought the Captivating Princess was Princess Charlotte. Partly because, well, she was a rather good looking young woman, but mostly because of the orgies.
While reviewing the Feast of the Exceptional Rose stuff this year, it noted that "The Captivating Princess was born in the year of the Fall." This means it is either Princess Louise or Princess Victoria, depending on the actual year of the Fall.
I suppose it could technically be the Queen Grand-Mum, but it doesn’t really seem to fit her character and she was mostly a Princess on technicality, so I’m ruling her out.
My records place the Fall at no later than 1862… which would work for Princess Helena, except that she’s more likely to still be on the Surface, being sensible and progressive and generally avoiding messing around with honey of any colour.
I thought '68 was the year of the Fall because of the First Sporing. I know the Royal Consort wasn’t scheduled to pass away until late '61, but he’d been truly ill during '60. If that was the year of the Fall, then I can go back to my original design of Charlotte, but I, for some reason, thought the Fall was much, much later than that.[li]
Then again, I’m rather hoping for Charlotte because she and I just seem made for each other.
I’m going by the London Gazette page which announces the Fall, which is dated for the week ending February 14, 1862. As for the First Sporing, well, it might have taken a few years for Greyfields to establish themselves, perfect their technique and release a commercial vintage.
[li]Well, here’s a few thoughts: I remember on the very old login page when the game was still Echo Bazaar, that they said it had been 30 (I’ll admit, my memory is SLIGHTLY hazy here, it MAY have been 20, but I don’t think so) years since the Fall. I also have the quality "A Veteran of Mr Sacks’ Visits 3 - A Veteran of the Visit of 1890". Going by those two tidbits, I believe the first Year the game was would would have been in-game time of 1888… which would make the year of the Fall 1858, assuming my memory can be trusted.
Presuming the 3 decades is approximate, I’m guessing my first instinct for Charlotte is probably right as there don’t appear to be any royals born in '58 or '59.
Unless I’m forgetting someone.
[color=#009900]Hi all![/color]
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[/color][color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]The Fall was complete in 1862, although the process began very late in 1861. The newspaper Sir Fred refers to has the most canonical date, the one he cites - you can see it on my Twitter background here: [/color]https://twitter.com/alexiskennedy[color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]. This is a week-ending date, so technically the Fall might have occurred the previous Tuesday or something. I don’t think I’ll ever feel inclined to get more specific than this. :-)[/color]
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[color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]Fallen London launched in September 1888 by the Bazaar’s calendar, September 2009 by our reckoning. The years advance at the same rate. So to be precise to two degrees of nerdery, the interval was twenty-six-and-a-half years.[/color]
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[color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]We’ve often said ‘thirty years’, as a rough round number because we didn’t want to have to keep updating the number every year.[/color][li] edited by Alexis on 8/12/2013
One thing to bear in mind is that this is an alternative history where the Prince Consort did not die - it is not beyond the realms of possibility that the Empress had another child.
Narratively speaking, I suspect that we wouldn’t be specifically told the year of her birth unless A: she has a real-world analogue and there’s some history nerdery being displayed (right there with you, Alexis), or B: we are to infer that the circumstances of her birth had some curious effect upon her physiology. Which would be slightly sinister, as the Captivating Princess -looks- like one of the most normal of the royal family. And their Neathy equivalents, too!
(Edit: I’m second-guessing myself; I can think of two or three more perfectly plausible reasons to make particular note of her birth-year, including to particularly signify that she’s a fictional character in an alternate history. And/or because she represents Fallen London itself - beautiful, indulgent, terrifying. So, I have no idea.) edited by Sir Frederick Tanah-Chook on 8/12/2013
I have been unable to find any obvious real-world candidates for The Captivating Princess, but then my history nerdery tends more toward the Middle Ages, so I may be missing someone. However, I suspect that because of the Masters’ intervention in Prince Albert’s illness, the Traitor Empress had another child, and it is she who so Captivates us.
There are no children or grandchildren of Victoria who were born in 1862. This means that either her birth year is approximate, in which case the closest two would be Charlotte or Victoria of Hesse.
Or Prince Henry had a sex change. That could have happened.
If she’s Victoria and Albert’s 10th child, that would mean Her Majesty had her when she was 42 or 43 and it was the longest length of time between children the two ever had. I suppose that is the most likely then. edited by Nigel Overstreet on 8/13/2013