House of Bernadotte

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The House of Bernadotte is the current royal house of Sweden, founded there in 1818 by King Charles XIV John. It was also the royal house of Norway between 1818 and 1905. Its founder was born in Pau in southern France as Jean Bernadotte. Bernadotte, who had been made a General of Division and Minister of War for his service in the French Army during the French Revolution, and Marshal of the French Empire and Prince of Pontecorvo under Napoleon, was adopted by the elderly king of Sweden Charles XIII, who had no other heir and whose Holstein-Gottorp branch of the House of Oldenburg thus was soon to be extinct on the Swedish throne. The current king of Sweden, Carl XVI Gustaf, is a direct descendant of Charles XIV John.

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