Sybille de Selys Longchamps
 | This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (January 2020) |
Sybille de Selys Longchamps | |
|---|---|
| Born | Baroness Sybille Michèle Emilie Marie Ghislaine de Selys Longchamps 28 August 1941 Uccle, Belgium |
| Spouses | Michael Anthony Rathborne Cayzer
(m. 1982; died 1990) |
| Children | Princess Delphine of Belgium |
| Parents |
|
Countess Sybille de Selys Longchamps, Hon. Mrs. Rathborne Cayzer (born 28 August 1941) is a Belgian noblewoman. She is the former mistress of King Albert II, with whom she has a daughter, Princess Delphine.[1]
Born in Uccle, Longchamps is the daughter of Count Michel François de Selys Longchampsand Countess Pauline Julie Cornet de Ways-Ruart. In 1962, she married Jonkheer Jacques Boël (born in 1929), an industrialist and nephew of Count René Boël. They divorced in 1978 and in 1982 Sybille married a wealthy British widower, the Honourable Michael Anthony Rathborne Cayzer (1929–1990), a younger son of shipping tycoon Herbert Cayzer, 1st Baron Rotherwick.
In 1968, Longchamps gave birth to daughter Delphine Boël. Longchamps was engaged in an extra-marital relationship with Prince Albert (later King) of Belgium. [2] In 2013, the Baroness granted an interview with Belgian network VIER in a television special entitled, 'Onze dochter heet Delphine' (Our Daughter is Called Delphine). The baroness told the interviewer that she and the Prince took no precautions as she thought she was unable to become pregnant. Delphine was born in 1968 but not formally recognized as King Albert's daughter until 2021.[3] [4]
De Selys Longchamps lived with her second husband in London and at his rural estate until the early 1990s and lives now in Brussels and Provence.
References
- ^ "Belgium's ex-King Albert II admits fathering child after DNA test". BBC News. 27 January 2020. Retrieved 28 January 2020.
- ^ Higgins, Andrew (2013-07-19). "Belgium Is Also Awaiting Possible News of a New Royal". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-01-27.
- ^ https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/28/world/europe/belgium-king-albert-delphine-boel.html
- ^ https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2013/09/04/_we_didn_t_take_precautionsithoughticouldnthaveababy-1-1720671/
- Oscar Coomans de Brachène, État présent de la noblesse belge, Annuaire de 1998, première partie (de Selys Longchamps), p. 187-197, Brussels, 1998.
- Oscar Coomans de Brachène, État présent de la noblesse belge, Annuaire de 2003, seconde partie (Boël), p. 354-358, Brussels, 2003.
- Delphine Boël, Couper le cordon, Brussels, ed. Wever & Bergh, 2008