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# Princess Yvonne zu Sayn-Wittgenstein-Sayn, aged 13, and her brother Prince Alexander zu Sayn-Wittgenstein-Sayn, aged 12, on holiday in Majorca in 1955
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/13-letniaia-kniazhna-ivonna-tsu-sain-vitgenshtein-sain-i-ee-brat-12-letnii-kniaz-aleksandr-tsu-sain-vitgenshtein-sain-otdykhaiut-na-maiorke-v-1955-godu/
- Published: 2024-02-20T08:02:26.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-01T05:34:31.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: Aristocracy, Archive, Mores

Yvonne sips Dry Sack sherry, Alexander finishes off a cigarette.

The photograph is by the models' mother, Princess Marianne, who worked as a professional photographer for many years.

Marianne Sayn-Wittgenstein-Sayn is now 104, Yvonne 81 and Alexander 80\. All of them are alive and well. Prince Alexander has headed the House of Sayn-Wittgenstein-Sayn since the death of his father in 1961.

The Princes Sayn-Wittgenstein come from the Russian Empire. The founders of the line were Princess Leonilla Ivanovna Baryatinskaya and Prince Lev Petrovich Wittgenstein, who moved to Prussia and received the title of Princes of Sayn-Wittgenstein-Sayn from King Frederick William IV in 1861\. The house of the Princes Wittgenstein itself is originally Prussian and very ancient; they were counted among the sovereign lords of the Empire. Lev Petrovich's grandfather entered Russian service under Elizabeth Petrovna. His father, Pyotr Khristianovich, was granted the title of Most Serene Prince, with the right to pass it to his descendants, by the Prussian king in 1834, and Nicholas I allowed him to use the title in Russia as well. The ruined estate of Pyotr Khristianovich, bought with money given by the merchants of Saint Petersburg in gratitude for the defence of Saint Petersburg in 1812, stands in the Leningrad Region.