'His Highness' Helped Put a Micronation on the Map
Giorgio Carbone ruled for four decades over the tiny realm of Seborga, a self-proclaimed ministate in the Ligurian hills of northwest Italy.
Mr. Carbone, who died Nov. 25 at age 73, was first elected Prince of Seborga in 1963, and was henceforth properly addressed as "His Serene Highness Giorgio I," although local wags joking about his size and enthusiasm preferred "His Tremendousness."
The former head of the local flower raisers' agricultural cooperative, Mr. Carbone strode around Seborga, pop. 320, dressed in princely raiment of a white Nehru jacket adorned with medals and a blue sash. Coins in the local currency, called Luiginos, featured the prince's bearded profile and bore a fitting motto for Seborga's flower-strewn region in the Italian Riviera: sub umbra sede -- sit in the shade.
Mr. Carbone liked to greet tourists who flocked to the mountain village to see what seemed more a fairy tale princedom than a professed political reality.
Seborga's history stretches back to the Middle Ages, when a local monastery and then crusading Knights Templar ruled it under a constitution that local historians assert make its parliament the oldest in Europe. Mr. Carbone said that Seborga had been recognized by the Vatican as an independent state, and had never officially been made a part of Italy.
"He was right as a matter of law," says Guy P. Dancosse, a Montreal lawyer hired by Seborga to pursue its legal claims at the International Court of Justice. But, adds Mr. Dancosse, "the international bodies are not inclined to recognize what we call the ministates."
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Mr. Carbone, who died Nov. 25 at age 73, was first elected Prince of Seborga in 1963, and was henceforth properly addressed as "His Serene Highness Giorgio I," although local wags joking about his size and enthusiasm preferred "His Tremendousness."
The former head of the local flower raisers' agricultural cooperative, Mr. Carbone strode around Seborga, pop. 320, dressed in princely raiment of a white Nehru jacket adorned with medals and a blue sash. Coins in the local currency, called Luiginos, featured the prince's bearded profile and bore a fitting motto for Seborga's flower-strewn region in the Italian Riviera: sub umbra sede -- sit in the shade.
Mr. Carbone liked to greet tourists who flocked to the mountain village to see what seemed more a fairy tale princedom than a professed political reality.
Seborga's history stretches back to the Middle Ages, when a local monastery and then crusading Knights Templar ruled it under a constitution that local historians assert make its parliament the oldest in Europe. Mr. Carbone said that Seborga had been recognized by the Vatican as an independent state, and had never officially been made a part of Italy.
"He was right as a matter of law," says Guy P. Dancosse, a Montreal lawyer hired by Seborga to pursue its legal claims at the International Court of Justice. But, adds Mr. Dancosse, "the international bodies are not inclined to recognize what we call the ministates."