title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: For Helen and her son, the post-war period was marked by the interference of the Soviet Union in Romanian political life. In March 1945, the king was forced to accept a communist government headed by Petru Groza while the following year, the rigged general elections confirmed the hegemony of the PCR in the country. Finally, Michael I was forced to abdicate on 30 December 1947 and the royal family took the path of exile. She then returned to the Villa Sparta, where she divided her time among her family, gardening and the study of Italian art. Increasingly concerned about her finances, Helen finally left Italy for Switzerland in 1979 and died three years later with her son at her side.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: The third child and eldest daughter of Crown Prince Constantine of Greece and Princess Sophia of Prussia, Helen was born on 2 May 1896 in Athens during the reign of her grandfather, King George I. From birth, she received the nickname "Sitta" as her brother Alexander failed to correctly pronounce the English word "sister". Growing up, Helen developed a special affection for Alexander, only three years her senior.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Helen spent most of her childhood in the Greek capital. Every summer, the princess and her family travelled to the Hellenic Mediterranean aboard the royal yacht "Amphitrite" or visited Sophia's mother, the Dowager Empress Victoria in Germany. From the age of 8, Helen began to spend part of the summer in Great Britain, in the regions of Seaford and Eastbourne. The princess grew up in a strongly anglophile environment, among a cohort of British tutors and governesses, including Miss Nichols, who took special care of her.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: On 28 August 1909 a group of Greek officers, known as the "Military League," organized a coup d'état (called the Goudi coup) against the government of King George I, Helen's grandfather. While declaring to be monarchists, the League members, led by Nikolaos Zorbas, asked the king to dismiss his son from military posts. Officially, this was to protect the "Diadochos" from the jealousy that could stem from his friendship with some soldiers. But the reality was quite different: the officers blamed Constantine for the defeat of Greece against the Ottoman Empire during the Thirty Days' War of 1897.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: The situation was so tense that the sons of George I were finally forced to resign from their military posts to save their father from the shame of their being expelled. The "Diadochos" also decided to leave Greece with his wife and children. For several months, the family moved to the "Schloss Friedrichshof" at Kronberg in Germany. It was the first of many times that the 14-year-old Helen would have to go into exile.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: After much tension, the political situation eventually subsided in Greece and Constantine and his family were allowed to return to their homeland. In 1911, the "Diadochos" was restored in his military duties by the Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos. A year later, the First Balkan War broke out, which allowed Greece to annex large territories in Macedonia, Epirus, Crete and the North Aegean. It was also at the end of this conflict that King George I was assassinated in Thessaloniki on 18 March 1913 and Helen's father succeeded him on the Hellenic throne as King Constantine I.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: After these events, Helen spent long weeks touring Greece, of which she previously only knew the main towns and the island of Corfu. With her father and brother Alexander, she travelled in Greek Macedonia and the various battlefields of the First Balkan War. However, this period of calm was short-lived as the Second Balkan War broke out in June 1913. Once again, Greece emerged victorious from the conflict, allowing it to significantly expand its territory, which grew by 68% after the signing of the Treaty of Bucharest.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: During World War I, King Constantine I first sought to maintain Greece in a position of neutrality. He considered that his country was not yet ready to participate in a new conflict after the Balkan Wars. But, educated in Germany and linked to Emperor William II (who was his brother-in-law), Constantine I was quickly accused of supporting the Triple Alliance and wishing for the defeat of the Allies. The king quickly fell out with his Prime Minister Venizelos, who was convinced of the need to support the countries of the Triple Entente to fulfill the so-called "Megali Idea". In October 1916, Venizelos, protected by the Entente countries, and in particular by the French Republic, formed a parallel government in Thessaloniki. Central Greece was occupied by the allied forces and the country was soon in the middle of a civil war, the so-called National Schism.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Weakened by all these tensions, Constantine I became seriously ill in 1915. Suffering from pleurisy aggravated by a pneumonia, he remained in bed for several weeks and nearly died. In Greece, public opinion was affected by the rumor, spread by Venizelists, that the king was not sick but that Queen Sophia in fact injured him in the course of an argument where she tried to force him to fight alongside the emperor. The health of the sovereign declined so much, that a ship was sent to the Island of Tinos in order to seek the miraculous Icon of the Virgin and Child, which was supposed to heal the sick. After kissing the holy picture, the king partially recovered his health. But the situation remained worrying and the king was in need of surgery before he could reassume his duties. These events had a special impact on Princess Helen, who was very close to her father: impressed by his recovery, she developed a deep religiosity, a trait that she would retain throughout her life.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Despite these difficulties, Constantine I refused to change his policies and was faced with the increasingly clear opposition of the Triple Entente and Venizelists. Thus, on 1 December 1916 the so-called Greek Vespers took place where the Allied soldiers fought against Greek reservists in Athens and the French fleet bombarded the Royal Palace. On this occasion, Helen was nearly killed by a gunfire from the Zappeion. After hearing the gunshots and worried for the life of her father, the princess ran to the gardens of the royal palace but was saved by the royal Garde du Corps which took her back inside the palace.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Finally, on 10 June 1917, Charles Jonnart, the Allied High Commissioner in Greece, asked the king for his abdication. Under the threat of an invasion in Piraeus, the king agreed and went into exile, but without formally abdicating. The Allies did not wish to establish a Republic in Greece, so one of the members of the royal family had to stay and succeed him. Because the "Diadochos" George was also considered pro-German like his father, they wanted someone considered malleable, as a puppet ruler of Constantine I's enemies. Finally the younger brother of the "Diadochos", Prince Alexander, was chosen by Venizelos and the Triple Entente as the new king.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: On 11 June 1917 the Greek royal family secretly fled from their palace, surrounded by a loyalist mob that refused to see them go. In the days that followed, Constantine I, Queen Sophia and five of their children left Greece from the port of Oropos and took the road to exile. This was the last time that Helen saw her favorite brother. In fact, on their return to power, the Venizelists prohibited any contact between King Alexander I and the rest of the royal family.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: After crossing the Ionian Sea and Italy, Helen and her family settled in Switzerland, mainly among the cities of St. Moritz, Zürich and Lucerne. In exile, Helen's parents were soon followed by almost all members of the royal family, who left their country with the return of Venizelos as Prime Minister and the entry of Greece to the war alongside the Triple Entente. However, the financial position of the royal family was precarious and Constantine I, haunted by a deep sense of failure, soon fell ill. In 1918, he contracted Spanish flu and again was close to death.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Very concerned about the fate of their father, Helen and her sisters Irene and Katherine spent a long time with him to distract him from his worries. Helen also sought to reconnect with Alexander I. She tried to take advantage of the visit of her brother to Paris in 1919 to call him by phone. However, the officer who escorted the king in the French capital refused to pass along either her communications or those of other members of the royal family.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In 1920, the Greek exiles were visited in Lucerne by Queen Marie of Romania (Sophia's first cousin) and her daughters Elisabeth, Maria and Ileana. Worried about the future of her eldest and still single son, the "Diadochos" George, who had already proposed to Princess Elisabeth a few years earlier, Queen Sophia was anxious for him to marry. Homeless, penniless and without any real political value since his exclusion from the Greek throne in 1917, Helen's elder brother reiterated his request of marriage to Princess Elizabeth, who, despite her initial reticence, finally decided to accept. Pleased with the union, the Queen of Romania then invited her future son-in-law and his sisters Helen and Irene to go to Bucharest in order to publicly announce the royal engagement. The princesses accepted and the departure was set to 2 October. In the meanwhile, another member of the Romanian royal family arrived to Lucerne. This was Elisabeth's brother, the Crown Prince Carol, who had just completed a trip around the world which he had undertaken in order to forget his morganatic wife Zizi Lambrino and their son Carol.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In Romania George, Helen and Irene were received with pomp by the royal family. Housed at Pelișor Castle, they were a central part of the celebrations for the return of Crown Prince Carol to his country (10 October) and the announcement of the engagement of Elisabeth with the "Diadochos" (12 October). The stay of the Greek princes, however, was brief. On 24 October, a telegram arrived which announced the death in Zurich of the Dowager Duchess of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, who was the mother of the queen of Romania. The very next day, another message arrived informing the Greek princes that Alexander I had suddenly died in Athens, following a monkey bite.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Under these circumstances, the three Greek princes and Queen Marie of Romania decided to make an emergency return to Switzerland. Moved by the situation and probably pushed by his mother, Crown Prince Carol at the last moment decided to travel along with them. After being cold and distant to Helen during her stay at Romania, the crown prince suddenly turned very attentive to the princess. During the train journey, the two told their life stories to each other and Carol confided in Helen about his affair with Zizi Lambrino. Helen likewise told him of her life and of family matters, including her great grief for her brother Alexander's death and how she did not want to return to Greece now that her only real friend, her beloved brother, was dead. This opening of the hearts to each other had the result that Helen fell in love with the heir to the Romanian throne.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Soon after their arrival in Switzerland, Crown Prince Carol asked for Helen's hand in marriage, much to the joy of the queen of Romania, but not to the princess' parents. Helen was determined to accept the marriage proposal, therefore King Constantine I assented to the engagement, but only after the marriage of Carol and Zizi Lambrino could be quickly dissolved. For her part, Queen Sophia was much less favorable to her daughter's wedding. Having no confidence in the Romanian crown prince, she tried to convince Helen to reject the proposal. However, Helen insisted, and despite the doubts of her mother, the engagement was announced in Zürich in November 1920.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Meanwhile, in Greece, the Venizelists lost the election in favor of Constantine I's supporters on 14 November 1920. Desiring to resolve the dynastic question, on 5 December the new cabinet organized a referendum, the disputed results of which showed that 99% of the population demanded the restoration of the sovereign. Under these conditions, the royal family returned to Athens and Helen was accompanied by her fiancé on her return. For two months, the two traveled discovering inner Greece and its ancient ruins. They then went to Bucharest to attend the wedding of "Diadochos" George with Elisabeth of Romania (27 February 1921) before returning to Athens to celebrate their own wedding in the Metropolitan Cathedral on 10 March 1921. Being the first Greek princess to marry in Athens, Helen wore the Romanian 'Greek Key' tiara, a gift from her mother-in-law. The newlyweds then spent their honeymoon in Tatoi, where they remained for two months before returning to Romania, on 8 May 1921.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Upon her return to Romania, Helen was already pregnant. She spent some time with Carol at the Cotroceni Palace, where the pomp and protocol of the Court both impressed and bored her at the same time. The couple then took up residence at the Foișor, an elegant Swiss-style chalet built in the surroundings of Peleș Castle, at Sinaia. It was there that the crown princess gave birth after only seven and a half months after her wedding. Her only child, Prince Michael, named in honor to Michael the Brave, the first unifier of the Danubian Principalities, was born on 25 October 1921; the childbirth was difficult and required surgery. The ordeal significantly weakened Helen, and the doctors forbade her from having a second pregnancy.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Once Helen had recovered, in December 1921 the couple moved to Bucharest, in a large villa at the Șoseaua Kiseleff. Despite their significantly different points of interest, Carol and Helen managed, for some time, to lead a bourgeois and happy existence. In the mornings, the heir performed his official duties and in the afternoons, they enjoyed their favorite past times. While the crown prince engaged in reading and his stamp collections, she spent her time engaged in horseback riding or on the decoration of their residences. The crown princess was very involved in social work and founded a nursing school in the capital. She was also appointed an Honorary Colonel of the 9th Cavalry Regiment, the "Roșiori".


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In the meantime, the political situation was deteriorating in Greece. The Hellenic Kingdom endured a period of unrest during the Greco-Turkish War, and by 1919 the health of King Constantine I was deteriorating once again. Worried about the future of her father, Helen asked for her husband's permission to return to Greece. The couple and their child thus left for Athens at the end of January 1922. But while Carol left Greece in February to attend the betrothal of his sister Maria to King Alexander I of Yugoslavia, Helen remained with her parents until April, when she returned to Romania, bringing her sister Irene. By that time, the crown prince had resumed his affair with his former mistress, the actress Mirella Marcovici.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In June 1922, Carol and Helen went to Belgrade with the whole Romanian royal family to attend the wedding of Alexander I and Maria. Back in Bucharest, the crown princess then resumed her role as wife of the heir to the throne. She participated in official acts and supported the sovereign and her husband during ceremonies that punctuated the life of the monarchy. Like many women of her rank, Helen was also interested in social works. Nevertheless, she continued to be worried for her family, and even visited her sister Irene, her aunt Maria and her Greek cousins in an futile attempt to console herself about the remoteness of her parents.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In September 1922, a military coup forced King Constantine I to abdicate in favor of his son George II, and to go into exile. Without any real power and dominated by the revolutionaries, after a failed coup of a pro-royalist group (the so-called Leonardopoulos–Gargalidis coup d'état) in October 1923, the new sovereign in turn was forced to abdicate after only fifteen months of reign. Devastated by these events, Helen immediately went to Italy to be with her parents in their exile. Shortly after the coronation of King Ferdinand I and Queen Marie of Romania in Alba Iulia on 15 October 1922, Helen left for Palermo, where she remained until the death of her father, on 11 January 1923.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Bored by the absence of his wife, Carol finally invited his mother-in-law to stay in Bucharest. However, the dowager queen did not arrive alone: with her, and without warning, came no fewer than 15 Greek princes and princesses, to his home. Increasingly irritated by the invasive presence of his wife's family, Carol also was hurt by Helen's attitude because she refused to fulfil her marital duties. Jealous, the crown prince suspected that his wife had begun an affair with the charming Prince Amedeo of Savoy, Duke of Aosta, a regular guest of the Greek royal couple in Sicily. It was due to these circumstances that Helen and Carol began their separation, though the crown princess saved appearances by devoting more time to the education of her son, Prince Michael.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In the summer of 1924, Carol met Elena Lupescu (better known under the name of "Magda" Lupescu), with whom he began an affair in or around 14 February 1925. This was not the first extramarital relationship of the crown prince since his marriage. However, for Carol, this time there was a serious bond, a fact that would soon worry not only Helen (always of a conciliatory and tolerant disposition with her husband's infidelities) but also the rest of the Romanian royal family, which feared that Lupescu could turn into a new Zizi Lambrino. In November 1925, Carol was sent to the United Kingdom to represent the royal family at the funeral of the Dowager Queen Alexandra. Despite several promises made to his father, King Ferdinand I, he took advantage of traveling abroad to find his mistress and openly live out their relationship. Refusing to return to Bucharest, Carol finally officially renounced the throne and prerogatives as crown prince on 28 December 1925.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In Romania, Helen was distraught by Carol's attitude, especially as Queen Marie made her partly responsible for the failure of her marriage. The crown princess wrote to her husband to convince him to return. She also attempted to convince politicians to delay Carol's exclusion to the royal succession and proposed to her in-laws that she herself take a trip to meet with her husband. However, the Prime Minister Ion Brătianu, who despised the crown prince because of his sympathy to the National Peasants' Party, categorically opposed. The head of government even accelerated the exclusion procedures by summoning both Houses of the Parliament to register the act of renunciation and appoint little Prince Michael as the new heir to the throne.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: On 4 January 1926, the Romanian Parliament ratified the acceptance of Carol's renunciation and a royal ordinance was issued giving Helen the title princess of Romania; in addition, she was included in the Civil list, a privilege previously reserved to the sovereign and the heir to the throne. After King Ferdinand I was diagnosed with cancer, a Regency Council was also formed during Michael's minority with Prince Nicholas as the Head, assisted by Patriarch Miron and the magistrate Gheorghe Buzdugan, replaced after his death in 1929 by Constantine Sărățeanu. Despite this, Helen continued to hope for the return of her husband and obstinately refused requests for a divorce that he sent to her from abroad.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In June 1926, shortly before the death of her father-in-law, Helen went to Italy to attend the funeral of her paternal grandmother, Dowager Queen Olga of Greece, and moved with her mother to the "Villa Bobolina" in Fiesole. The princess took advantage of her stay in Italy and to try to arrange for an encounter with her husband but, having initially accepted to see her, Carol canceled the meeting at the last minute.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In the spring of 1927, Queen Marie made an official visit to the United States. During her absence, Helen and her sister-in-law Elisabeth took care of King Ferdinand I, whose health declined rapidly. The king died on 20 July 1927 at Peleș Castle and his 5-year-old grandson succeeded him under the name of Michael I while the Regency Council took over the direction of the country. However, in Romania, Carol retained many supporters (soon nicknamed "Carlists") and the National Liberal Party began to fear the return of the Prince.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: After trying to convince her husband to go to Bucharest, Helen gradually changed her attitude towards him. Anxious to preserve the rights of her son and probably convinced by Prime Minister Barbu Știrbey, the princess requested a divorce, which she easily obtained. On 21 June 1928, the marriage was dissolved by the Romanian Supreme Court on the grounds of incompatibility. Helen also distanced herself from her mother-in-law, who complained of being separated from the young king and criticized more openly the Greek entourage of the Princess. Under these circumstances, the dowager queen approached her eldest son and built ties with the Carlist movement.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: After the Regency Council failed to govern the country, Carol appeared increasingly as a providential man who could solve the problems of Romania. Still, his supporters (as Prime Minister Iuliu Maniu, leader of the National Peasants' Party) continued to demand his separation from Magda Lupescu and his reconciliation with Helen, which he refused. Thanks to his many supporters in the country, the prince finally organized his return to Bucharest on the night of 6–7 June 1930. Joyfully welcomed by the population and the political class, he then proclaimed himself king under the name of Carol II.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: When he came to power, Carol II initially refused to see Helen though he expressed his desire to meet his son, demoted to the rank of heir-apparent to the throne with the title of "Grand Voivod of Alba Iulia" by the Romanian Parliament (8 June 1930). In order to be reunited with Michael, the king therefore resolved to meet his former wife. Accompanied by his brother Nicholas and his sister Elizabeth, he visited the princess in her villa in the Șoseaua Kiseleff. At the sight of her former husband, Helen showed coldness but she had no other alternative than to offer him her friendship for the sake of their child.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In the following weeks, Helen suffered the combined pressures of politicians and the Romanian Orthodox Church, who were trying to persuade her to resume her conjugal life with Carol II and accept to be crowned along with him at a ceremony in Alba Iulia, scheduled on 21 September 1930. Despite her reluctance, the princess agreed to a reconciliation and reconsidered the annulment of her divorce, but under the condition of having a separate residence. These were the circumstances under which the former spouses lived and while Carol II sometimes went to Helen for lunch with her, the princess would, from time to time, have tea with him in the royal palace. In July, the king, his former wife and son traveled together in Sinaia but while Carol II moved to "Foișor", Helen and Michael stayed at Peleș Castle. Each day, the family gathered for tea and, on 20 July, Carol II and Helen appeared publicly together on the occasion of a ceremony in memory of King Ferdinand I.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In August 1930, the government presented a decree to Carol II for his signature officially confirming Helen as "Her Majesty, the Queen of Romania." The king, however, crossed this out and declared Helen to be "Her Majesty Helen" (i.e. with the style Majesty, but not the title Queen). Helen refused to allow anyone to use this style in her presence. Due to these circumstances, the proposed coronation of the two former spouses was postponed. The return of Magda Lupescu to Romania finally put an end to the reconciliation efforts of the pair. Soon the king was able to get Michael moved to his side, and Helen was allowed to see her son every day in exchange for her political silence. Increasingly isolated, the princess was forced into exile by her former husband, she consented to a separation agreement in October 1931. In exchange for her silence, and through the mediation of her brother, the former King George II of Greece, and her sister-in-law Elisabeth, Helen then obtained a substantial monetary compensation. With the approval of Carol II, she obtained the right to stay four months a year in Romania and to receive her son abroad during two months of the year. She retained her residence in Bucharest and the king agreed to fund its maintenance during his absence. Especially, Helen received a sum of thirty million lei to buy a home abroad and in addition she obtained an annual pension of seven million lei.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In November 1931, Helen left Romania for Germany, where she went to the bedside of her mother, the Dowager Queen Sophia of Greece, seriously ill with cancer. After her death on 13 January 1932, Helen bought her house in Fiesole, Tuscany, which she used as her main residence. In this large house, that she renamed Villa Sparta, the princess received the visit of her sisters Irene and Katherine and her brother Paul, who remained with Helen on long stays.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Despite the distance, the friction between Helen and Carol II continued. In September 1932, a visit from Michael and his mother to the United Kingdom was used by Helen as an opportunity for a new, very public conflict, which soon made the headlines of the international press, just as Helen wanted. The king wanted the crown prince not to wear shorts in public, and that he not be photographed in the company of his mother. Helen was incensed at the second stipulation and, as was her wont, took the trouble to aggravate the situation by defying the first stipulation as well. She made sure her son was dressed in shorts and posed for the cameras with him at her side for an extended photo opportunity. After seeing the spectacle of the crown prince in shorts published in the newspapers, the king demanded that the heir to the throne be brought back to Bucharest. Helen now decided to grant an interview to the "Daily Mail" "in the hope," she said, "that public opinion would help to preserve her parental rights". This was followed by a violent press campaign, which enraged the king. Despite these events, Helen chose to return to Romania for Michael's birthday and threatened to go to the International Court of Justice if Carol II did not allow her to see their son.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Back in Bucharest, the princess tried, without much success, to get the government involved in a case against the king. She then turned again to her sister-in-law, the former queen of the Hellenes. However, the latter was deeply shocked by the interview given to the "Daily Mail", and the two women had a violent fight during their reunion, where Elisabeth even slapped Helen. Carol II then considered his former wife as a political opponent, and in order to undermine her prestige, the king initiated a campaign in the press against her, claiming that she had tried to commit suicide twice. After only a month in the country, Carol II imposed a new separation agreement (1 November 1932), under which Helen was denied the right to return to Romania and the next day, finally forced her into permanent exile in Italy. During the following years, she had no contact with her former husband, who only briefly told her by telephone of the death of Queen Marie in 1938. Despite the tensions, Prince Michael was able to see his mother every year in Florence for two months.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In Fiesole, the life of Helen and her sisters was relatively retired, even though they were frequently visited by the Italian House of Savoy, which had always been welcoming to the Greek royal family during its exile. The Greek princesses also used their connections to find a wife for "Diadochos" Paul, who remained single. In 1935, they took advantage of the presence in Florence of Princess Frederica of Hanover to arrange an encounter between her and their brother. Their good efforts paid off and Frederica quickly fell in love with the "Diadochos". However, the princess' parents were reluctant to approve this relationship and it was not until 1937 that Paul and Frederica were finally allowed to get engaged. In the meantime, the Greek monarchy was restored and George II once again became King of Greece, but his wife Elisabeth, who filed for divorce on 6 July 1935, remained in Romania.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In Tuscany, Helen found real stability, despite the absence of her son most of the year. However, the outbreak of World War II again disrupted her daily routine. In accordance with the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Union forced Romania to cede Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina to them on 26 June 1940, and a few weeks later, the country was also forced to surrender Northern Transylvania to Hungary (Second Vienna Award, 30 August 1940) and the Southern Dobruja to Bulgaria (Treaty of Craiova, 7 September 1940); these territorial losses ended the Greater Romania, created at the end of World War I. Unable to maintain the territorial integrity of his country and under pressure from the Iron Guard, a fascist party supported by Nazi Germany, Carol II became increasingly unpopular and finally was forced to abdicate on 6 September 1940. His son Michael, aged 18, became king while General Ion Antonescu established a dictatorship with the support of members of the Iron Guard.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Eager to obtain the favor of the new sovereign (and some legitimation to his dictatorship), Antonescu granted Helen the title of "Queen Mother of Romania" ("Regina-mamă Elena") with the style "Her Majesty" on 8 September 1940 and sent the diplomat Raoul Bossy to Fiesole to persuade her to return to Bucharest (12 September 1940). Back in Romania (14 September 1940), Helen found herself, however, subject to the whim of the dictator, determined to keep the royal family in a purely ceremonial role. Indeed, in the years that followed, Antonescu systematically excluded the king and his mother from political responsibility and didn't even bother to warn them of his decision to declare war on the Soviet Union in June 1941.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In this difficult context, Michael I was at times prone to bouts of depression and Helen then concentrated all of her efforts to make him more active. Aware of his shortcomings, the queen mother appealed to historians of the right to train her son in his role as sovereign. She also guided the king in his talks and pushed him to oppose Antonescu when she deemed that his policies endangered the crown. Alerted by the Rabbi Alexandru Șafran about the anti-Jewish persecutions, Helen personally appealed to the German ambassador Manfred Freiherr von Killinger and Antonescu to convince them to halt the deportations, being supported in her efforts by Patriarch Nicodim. For his part, the king vigorously protested to the "Conducător" at the time of the Odessa massacre and notably obtained the release of Wilhelm Filderman, president of the Romanian Jewish community.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Despite these few attempts of emancipation, Helen and her son spent most of the conflict playing as hosts of the German officers passing through Bucharest. The queen mother even met Hitler twice: firstly informally, with her sister Irene, to discuss the fate of Greece and Romania within the new Europe (December 1940) and secondly formally with Michael I during a trip in Italy (winter of 1941). Above all, Helen and her son had no choice but to officially support the dictatorship of Antonescu. Thus, it was Michael I who gave the "Conducător" the title of Marshal (21 August 1941) after the reconquest of Bessarabia by the Romanian Army.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In the fall of 1942, Helen played a major role in stopping Antonescu from his plans to deport all of the Jews of the "Regat" to the German death camp of Bełżec in Poland. According to SS "Hauptsturmführer" Gustav Richter, the counselor for Jewish Affairs at the German legation in Bucharest in a report sent to Berlin on 30 October 1942: "The queen mother told the king that what was happening...was a disgrace and that she could not bear it any longer, all the more so because [their names] would be permanently associated...with the crimes committed against the Jews, while she would be known as the mother of "Michael the Wicked". She is said to have warned the king that, if the deportations were not immediately halted, she would leave the country. As a result the King...telephoned Prime Minister Ion Antonescu and...a meeting of the Council of Ministers took place."


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: From 1941, the participation of the Romanian army in the invasion of the Soviet Union further damaged the relations between Antonescu and the royal family, who disapproved of the conquests of Odessa and Ukraine. However, it was the Battle of Stalingrad (23 August 1942 – 2 February 1943) and the losses incurred by the Romanian side that finally forced Michael I to organize around him a resistance against the dictatorship of the "Conducător". During an official speech on 1 January 1943, the sovereign publicly condemned the participation of Romania in the war against the Soviet Union, triggering the wrath of both Antonescu and the Nazi Germany, who accused Helen of being behind the royal initiative. In retaliation, Antonescu tightened his control over Michael I and his mother, and threatened the royal family with the abolition of the monarchy if any further provocation were to occur.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Over the next few months, the suspicious death of Tsar Boris III of Bulgaria (28 August 1943) and the successive arrests of princesses Mafalda of Savoy (23 September 1943) and Irene of Greece (October 1943) after the overthrow of Mussolini by King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy (25 July 1943), proved to Michael I and his mother just how dangerous opposition to the Axis powers was. The return of the Soviets in Bessarabia and the American bombing over Bucharest forced the king, despite everything, to break with the regime of Antonescu. On 23 August 1944 Michael I organized a coup d'état against the "Conducător", who was imprisoned. In the process, the king and his new government declared war on the Axis powers and asked the Romanian forces not to resist the Red Army, which nevertheless continued its invasion into the country.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In retaliation against this betrayal, the "Luftflotte" bombed Bucharest and "Casa Nouă", the main residence of the sovereign and his mother since 1940, which was largely destroyed (24 August 1944). Nevertheless, the Romanian forces gradually managed to push the Germans out of the country and also attacked Hungary in order to liberate Transylvania (Siege of Budapest, 29 December 1944 – 13 February 1945). However, the Allies did not immediately recognize the reversal of Romania and the Soviets entered the capital on 31 August 1944. An armistice was finally signed with Moscow on 12 September 1944, which forced the kingdom to accept the Soviet occupation. A climate of uncertainty swept the country while the Red Army increased their demands.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Visiting Sinaia at the time of the royal coup d'état, Helen found her son the next day at Craiova. Back in Bucharest on 10 September 1944, the king and his mother moved into the residence of Princess Elizabeth, whose relations with Helen remained tense despite their reconciliation in 1940. With the increased instability in Romania, the queen mother was extremely concerned about the safety of her son, fearing that he could eventually be killed, like Prince-Regent Kiril of Bulgaria, shot by the Communists on 1 February 1945. The queen mother also disapproved of the influence of Ioan Stârcea over the sovereign and, following information from one of the palace servants, accused him of espionage on behalf of Antonescu. She was also concerned about the machinations of Carol II, who apparently waited for the end of the war to return to Romania, and observed with anxiety the political crisis that prevented King George II from regaining power in Greece. In this difficult context, Helen had the joy of learning that her sister Irene and her little nephew Amedeo were alive, although still in German hands.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Despite these political and personal concerns, the queen mother continued her charitable activities. She provided support to Romanian hospitals, and managed to save some of the equipment of the Red Army requisitions. On 6 November 1944 she inaugurated a soup kitchen in the ballroom of the Royal Palace, which served not less than 11,000 meals to children in the capital over the next three months. Finally, despite Moscow's opposition, the queen mother sent aid to Moldavia, where a terrible epidemic of typhus was raging.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: With the Soviet occupation, the staff of the Romanian Communist Party, which counted only a few thousand members during the coup of Michael I, exploded and demonstrations against the government of Constantin Sănătescu multiplied. At the same time, acts of sabotage were occurring all over the country, preventing the Romanian economy from recovering. Faced with the combined pressures of the representative of the Soviet Union, Andrey Vyshinsky, and the People's Democratic Front (offshoot of the Communist Party), the king needed to build a new government and named Nicolae Rădescu as the new Prime Minister (7 December 1944). Nevertheless, the situation remained tense in the country and when the new head of the government called for municipal elections on 15 March 1945, the Soviet Union resumed its destabilizing operations in order to impose a government of their liking. The refusal of the United States and United Kingdom to intervene on his behalf led the sovereign to consider abdication but he abandoned the idea on the advice of representatives of the two major democratic political forces, Dinu Brătianu and Iuliu Maniu. On 6 March 1945 Michael I finally called Petru Groza, leader of the Ploughmen's Front, as the new head of a government which had no association with any representative of either the Peasants and the Liberal parties.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Satisfied with this appointment, the Soviet authorities were more conciliatory with Romania. On 13 March 1945 Moscow transferred the administration of Transylvania to Bucharest. A few months later, on 19 July 1945, Michael I was decorated with the Order of Victory, one of the most prestigious Soviet military orders. Still, the Sovietization of the kingdom was accelerated. The purge of "fascist" personalities continued while censorship was strengthened. A land reform was also implemented, causing a drop in production which ruined agricultural exports. The king, however, managed to temporarily prevent the establishment of People's Tribunals and the restoration of the death penalty.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: After the Potsdam Conference and the reaffirmation by the Allies of the need to establish democratically elected governments in Europe, Michael I demanded the resignation of Petru Groza, who refused. Faced with this insubordination, the sovereign began a "royal strike" on 23 August 1945 during which he refused to countersign the acts of the government. With his mother, he locked himself in the Elisabeta Palace for six weeks before departing to Sinaia. The resistance of the monarch, however, was not supported by the West, who after the Moscow Conference of 25 December 1945, asked Romania to allow two opposition figures to enter the government. Disappointed by the lack of courage of London and Washington, the sovereign was shocked by the attitudes of Princesses Elisabeth and Ileana, who openly supported the communist authorities. Disgusted by all these betrayals, Helen, in turn, encouraged fewer meetings with Soviet officials and worried every day for the life of her son.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: The year 1946 was marked by the strengthening of the Communist dictatorship, despite active resistance of the sovereign. After several months of waiting, the parliamentary elections were held on 19 November 1946 and were officially won by the Ploughmen's Front. After that date, the situation of the king and his mother became more precarious. In their palace, they had no access to running water for three hours a day and the electricity was off most of the day. This did not prevent Helen from maintaining her charitable activities and continuing to send food and clothing to Moldavia. In early 1947, the queen mother also obtained permission to travel abroad to visit her family. She then reunited with her sister Irene, weakened after her deportation to Austria, attended the funeral of her elder brother, King George II, and participated in the marriage of her youngest sister, Princess Katherine, with British Major Richard Brandram.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: The signing of the Paris Peace Treaties, on 10 February 1947, marked a new stage in the sidelining of the royal family by the Communist regime. Deprived of any official duties, the king was found even more isolated than during the "royal strike". Under these conditions, the queen mother considered exile with more determination but she was concerned that they did not possess any foreign resources, because her son refused to save money outside of Romania. As guests to the marriage of Princess Elizabeth of the United Kingdom with Prince Philip of Greece and Denmark (Helen's first-cousin) on 20 November 1947, Michael I and his mother were provided with an opportunity to travel together abroad. During this stay, the king fell in love with Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parma, with whom he became engaged much to Helen's delight. This trip was also an opportunity for the queen mother to place two small paintings of El Greco from the royal collections in a Swiss bank.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Despite the advice of their relatives, who urged them not to return to Romania in order to escape the communists, the king and his mother returned to Bucharest on 21 December 1947. They were coldly greeted by the government, which secretly hoped to see them stay abroad in order to abolish the monarchy. Their plan did not work, so Prime Minister Petru Groza and General Secretary of the Romanian Communist Party Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej decided to compel the sovereign to abdicate. On 30 December 1947 they asked for an audience with the king, who received them along with his mother. The two politicians asked Michael I to sign a declaration of abdication. The king refused, stating that, for such a thing, the Romanian population must be consulted. The two men threatened that if he persisted, over 1000 students arrested would be executed in retaliation. Thousands of people, including many students, were arrested in November 1946, after clashes with the Communist forces. The pro-democracy and freedom population defeated the Communist forces which were sent to the protests by the Communist government, but in return, many protesters were arrested by Communist authorities, with the help of the Red Army. The heavy clashes ensued in Bucharest and other big cities in Romania after the Communist Party falsified the votes for the 1946 Parliament elections, which the National Peasant's Party (PNȚ) had won with over 70%. Forced with this blackmail, Michael I renounced the crown. Only hours after the announcement, the Romanian People's Republic was proclaimed. Michael I and Helen left Romania with some partisans on 3 January 1948. Despite their close links with the Communists, Princesses Elisabeth and Ileana were also forced to leave the country a few days later, on 12 January.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In exile, Michael I and Helen settled for some time in Switzerland, where the deposed sovereign bitterly observed the Western acceptance of the establishment of a communist republic in Romania. For her part, Helen was mostly concerned with the state of their finances because the Communists allowed them to part with almost nothing. Despite their promises, the new Romanian authorities nationalized the properties of the former royal family (20 February 1948) and deprived the former monarch and his relatives of their nationality (17 May 1948). At the same time, the king and his mother had to deal with the intrigues of Carol II, who still considered himself the only legitimate sovereign of Romania and accused his ex-wife of keeping him away from their son. To achieve his ends, Carol II did not hesitate to involve Frederick, Prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen (Head of the dynasty) and Prince Nicholas of Romania in his intrigues. These concerns did not prevent Michael I and his mother from undertaking several political trips to the United Kingdom, France and the United States to meet with government leaders and representatives of the Romanian diaspora.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Another source of concern from Michael I and his mother during their first months of exile was his marriage with Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parma. To discredit the former monarch, the Romanian authorities promoted rumors that Michael I gave up his dynastic rights in order to marry the woman of his heart, as his father did in 1925.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Added to this, the most serious difficulties were related to religion. Being a Roman Catholic, Princess Anne had to obtain a papal dispensation to marry an Orthodox. However, the Vatican had been extremely reluctant to grant consent because, for dynastic reasons, the couple's children would have to be raised in Michael I's religion. After Prince René of Bourbon-Parma, father of the bride, failed in his negotiations with the Vatican, Helen decided to go to Rome with Princess Margaret of Denmark (Anne's mother) to meet Pope Pius XII. However, the meeting ended badly and the Pope refused to agree to the marriage. Under these circumstances, Princess Anne had no choice but to override the pontifical will and abandon a Catholic marriage. In doing so, she incurred the wrath of her uncle, Prince Xavier of Bourbon-Parma, who forbade the members of his family to attend the royal wedding under threat of being excluded from the House of Bourbon-Parma. Once again, the queen mother tried to mediate, this time with Anne's family, but without success.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Helen had better luck with her own family. Her brother, King Paul I of Greece, offered to organize Michael's wedding in Athens, despite official protests from the Romanian government. The wedding was finally celebrated in the Greek capital on 10 June 1948 with Archbishop Damaskinos himself officiating the ceremony. Celebrated in the throne room of the Royal Palace, the wedding brought together most of the members of the Greek dynasty but no representative of the Houses of Bourbon-Parma or Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen. In fact, Carol II was not invited to the wedding, despite Helen having written to him about the marriage.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: After the marriage of Michael I and Anne, Helen returned to Villa Sparta in Fiesole. Through 1951, she hosted her son and his family, who visited with her at least twice a year. Over the years, the family of the former king grew with the successive births of princesses Margareta (1949), Elena (1950), Irina (1953), Sophie (1957) and Maria (1964). From 1949 to 1950, Helen also housed her sister Irene and her nephew Amedeo, who later settled in a neighboring residence. Over the years, the two Greek princesses retained a strong bond, which ended with the death of the duchess of Aosta in 1974. Throughout her life, Helen also remained deeply attached to Amedeo and his first wife, Princess Claude of Orléans.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Helen also made many trips abroad to visit her relatives. She traveled regularly to the United Kingdom to see her granddaughters, who were schooling there. Despite her sometimes stormy relationship with her sister-in-law, Queen Frederica, Helen also spent long periods in Greece and participated in the cruise of the Kings (1954), the marriage of Princess Sophia with the future King Juan Carlos I of Spain (1962) and the events organized to mark the centenary of the Greek dynasty (1963).


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Despite this, Helen's life was not solely devoted to her family. Passionate about Renaissance architecture and painting, she spent much of her time visiting monuments and museums. She also dedicated herself to creating artistic objects, for example an engraving made with a dentist's drill on an ivory billiard ball. A gardening enthusiast, she devoted long hours to the flowers and shrubs of her residence. A regular guest of the British Consulate, she also frequented the intellectuals who, like Harold Acton, had settled in the region of Florence. From 1968 to 1973, Helen had a romantic relationship with the twice-widower King Gustaf VI Adolf of Sweden, with whom she shared a love of art and plants. At one point, the Scandinavian sovereign asked her to marry him, but she refused.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In 1956 Helen consented for Arthur Gould Lee to publish her biography. At this point, her life was marked by financial difficulties which continued to worsen over time. Despite still being deprived of income by the Romanian authorities, the queen mother economically supported her son, and also helped him to find jobs, first as a pilot in Switzerland, then as a broker on Wall Street. Helen also supported the studies of her eldest granddaughter Margareta, and even welcomed her at Villa Sparta for a year before she entered a British university. To do this, Helen was forced to sell her assets one by one and in the early 1970s, she hardly had anything left. In 1973, she mortgaged her residence and three years later, she sold the two Greco paintings that she had brought with her from Romania in 1947.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Becoming too old to live alone, Helen finally left Fiesole in 1979. She then moved to a small apartment in Lausanne, located 45 minutes from the residence of Michael I and Anne, before moving in with them at Versoix in 1981. Helen, queen mother of Romania, died one year later on 28 November 1982, aged 86. She was buried without pomp in the Bois-de-Vaux Cemetery and the funerals were celebrated by Damaskinos Papandreou, the first Greek Orthodox Metropolitan of Switzerland.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Eleven years after her death, in March 1993, the State of Israel gave Helen the title of "Righteous Among the Nations" in recognition for her actions during World War II towards Romanian Jews, several thousands of whom she managed to save from 1941 to 1944. The announcement was made to the royal family by Alexandru Șafran, then Chief Rabbi of Geneva.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: In January 2018, it was announced that the remains of King Carol II would be moved to the new Archdiocesan and Royal Cathedral, along with those of Queen Mother Helen. In addition, the remains of Prince Mircea would also be moved to the new cathedral. His remains are currently interred at the Bran Castle's Chapel.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Queen Mother Helen of Romania was reburied at the New Episcopal and Royal Cathedral in Curtea de Argeș on 19 October 2019.


title: Helen of Greece and Denmark

text: Queen Helen's correspondence with the Romanian diplomat George I. Duca between 1940 and 1982 is preserved in the "George I. Duca Papers" collection in the Hoover Institution Archives (Stanford, California, USA).


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju Province, officially Jeju Special Self-Governing Province, is one of the nine provinces of South Korea. The province comprises Jeju Island (; ), formerly transliterated as Cheju or Cheju Do, the country's largest island. It was previously known as Quelpart to Europeans and during the Japanese occupation as Saishū. The island lies in the Korea Strait, southwest of South Jeolla Province, of which it was a part before it became a separate province in 1946. Its capital is Jeju City and it is home to South Korea's tallest mountain, Hallasan.


title: Jeju Province

text: According to the legend, three demigods emerged from Samseong, which is said to have been on the northern slopes of Mt. Halla and became the progenitors of the Jeju people, who founded the Kingdom of Tamna.


title: Jeju Province

text: It has also been claimed that three brothers, including Ko-hu, who were the 15th descendants of Koulla, one of the progenitors of the Jeju people, were received by the court of Silla, at which time the name Tamna was officially recognized, while the official government posts of Commander, Prince and Governor were conferred by the court upon the three. However, there is no concrete evidence of when the "Three Names" (Samseong-Ko, Yang and Pu) appeared nor the exact date of when Ko-hu and his brothers were received by Silla. The "Three Names" Founding Period may be assumed to have occurred during the Three Kingdoms (Goguryeo, Baekje and Silla) Period on the mainland of Korea.


title: Jeju Province

text: Taejo, founder of Goryeo, attempted to establish the same relationship between Goryeo and Tamna as Tamna had had with Silla. Tamna refused to accept this position and the Goryeo court dispatched troops to force Tamna to submit. Ko ja-gyeon, chief of Tamna, submitted to Goryeo in 938 and sent his son, Prince Mallo, to Goryeo's court as a de facto hostage. In 1105, (King Sukjong's 10th year), the Goryeo court abolished the name Takna, which had been used up to this time and, from that year on, the island was known as "Tamna-gun" (district) and Goryeo officials were sent to handle the affairs of the island.


title: Jeju Province

text: Tamna-country was changed to Tamna-county in 1153, during the reign of King Uijong and Choi Cheok-kyeong was posted as Tamna-Myeong or Chief of Tamna. During the reign of Gojong of Goryeo, Tamna was renamed "Jeju", which means "province across the sea".


title: Jeju Province

text: In 1271, General Kim Tong-jeong escaped with what remained of his Sambyeolcho force from Jindo and built the Hangpadu Fortress at Kwiil-chon from where they continued their fight against the combined Korean government-Mongolian army, but within two years, faced by an enemy army of over 10,000 troops, the Sambyeolcho was annihilated.


title: Jeju Province

text: After the Sambyeolcho Rebellion was crushed by the Yuan authorities, Tamna prefectures were established and were used to graze horses, until 1356.


title: Jeju Province

text: During the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910), Jeju islanders were treated as foreigners and Jeju was considered as a place for horse breeding and exile for political prisoners. In the 17th Century, Injo of Joseon issued an edict prohibiting islanders from travelling to the Korean mainland. Consequently, Jeju islanders staged several major uprisings, including the Kang Je Geom Rebellion (1862), Bang Seong Chil Rebellion (1898), and the Lee Jae Su Rebellion (1901).


title: Jeju Province

text: In 1910, Japan annexed Korea, including Jeju, inaugurating a period of hardship and deprivation for the islanders, many of whom were compelled to travel to the mainland or Japan for work. Residents of Jeju were active in the Korean independence movement during the period of Japanese rule. On Jeju, the peak of resistance came in 1931–32 when "haenyeo" ("sea women") from six eastern villages launched a protest against the Japanese-controlled Divers Association. Before it was brutally crushed, the protests spread and eventually 17,000 people participated, with over 100 arrested in Korea's largest protest movement ever led by women and fisheries workers.


title: Jeju Province

text: On April 3, 1948, against a background of an ongoing ideological struggle for control of Korea and a variety of grievances held by islanders against the local authorities, many communist sympathizers on the island attacked police stations and government offices. The brutal and often indiscriminate suppression of the rebellion resulted in the deaths of thousands of civilians and insurgents, and the imprisonment of thousands more in internment camps. 14,000 to 30,000 people were killed in total during the 13 month uprising.


title: Jeju Province

text: While claims have been made that the U.S. government oversaw and supported "anti-communist" activities administratively if not openly in the field, this remains unproven. The Northwest Youth League, a Korean government-sponsored watchdog group made up of refugees who had fled North Korea, actively repressed any and all "communist sympathizers" including a policy of shooting anyone entering or leaving the president's declared "enemy zone". This led to the deaths of hundreds of islanders. Many islanders were also raped and tortured. The isolation of Jeju and a cover up by the Korean government led to public ignorance of the Jeju uprising by mainland Koreans for many years. A 1988 documentary by Thames TV, "" and many activities and publications, including Sun-i Samch'on by Hyun Ki Young, by organizations and persons from within Cheju-do and around the world continue to attempt to shed the light on this event. The Uprising has become a symbol of Jeju's Independence from Korean Peninsula.


title: Jeju Province

text: The provincial administrative building was burned to the ground in September 1948 and a new building was completed in 1-do, 2-dong in December 1952.


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju Volcanic Island and Lava Tubes, unanimously at the 31st World Heritage Committee on June 27, 2007, was inscribed on the World Heritage list.


title: Jeju Province

text: In 2018, 500 refugees fleeing the civil war in Yemen came to Jeju Island, causing unease among the residents of Jeju Island.


title: Jeju Province

text: In 1273, the Mongolian Yuan Dynasty established a military governor on the island, and for nearly a hundred years the island was effectively under the complete control of these governors.


title: Jeju Province

text: During the Joseon Dynasty, all of the administrative rights and systems of Jeju island, which had maintained some independence until this time, were absorbed into the centralized form of government established by Joseon.


title: Jeju Province

text: In 1402, the titles of Commander and Prince were abolished. In 1416, the island was divided into three major administrative districts: The area lying generally north of Mt. Halla was headed by a 'Moksa' or county magistrate, while the eastern area of Jeongui-county (today's Seongeup Folk village) and the southwestern area of Daejeong-county (today's Moseulpo, Daejeong-eup, and Mt. Sanbang) were each headed by a Hyeon-gam (also county magistrate).


title: Jeju Province

text: In August 1864, both Jeongui and Daejeong hyeons were removed from the control of the 'moksa' north of the mountain in today's Jeju-si area and were renamed 'Gun" (county) and came under the direct control of the Gwanchalsa (governor) of Jeolla province. Because of strife between these 'Guns' and the Jeju 'moksa', the system was abolished in January 1880, and the two 'Guns' reverted again to 'hyeon'.


title: Jeju Province

text: In 1895, Jeju-mok was redesigned as Jeju-Bu with a governor (Gwanchalsa) and Vice-governor (Chamsagwan) and a police agency was newly established, while in both Jeongui and Daejeong the offices of 'Gunsu' (county chief) were re-established. The very next year, the office of 'Gunsu' was abolished and the old system was restored.


title: Jeju Province

text: Then in 1906, abolishing the Moksa system altogether, the Gunsu or County chief system was adopted. In 1910, Jeongui and Daejeong were included in Jeju gun while Chuja-myeon was placed under the jurisdiction of Wando-gun, part of South Jeolla province.


title: Jeju Province

text: Japan annexed Korea in 1910. In 1915, the "gun" or county system that had been adopted in 1906 was abolished and Jeju island was designated as part of the 'island' system and called Jeju myeon under South Jeolla province. In 1931, Jeju-myeon was raised to the status of Jeju-eup or 'township,' which gave the island one township (today's Jeju-si area) and 12 'myeon'. In 1945, Japan relinquished sovereignty over Korea and on September 1, 1955, Jeju Township was elevated to city status with 40 administrative wards, which, on January 1, 1962, were reduced to 14 wards. On July 8, 1956, Seogwi, Daejeong and Hallim-myeons were raised to the status of townships while the southwestern portion of Hallim Township was separated and newly designated as the Hankyeong district (myeon), which gave the province one city, two counties, three townships and 10 myeon or districts with 14 wards in Jeju City. May 23, 1979, saw the restructuring of the Jeju-si wards and the addition of three more, giving 17 wards.


title: Jeju Province

text: In March 1980, the construction of a new provincial office was started in Yeon-dong of Jeju-si and in December of that year the four myeon of Aewol, Gujwa, Namwon and Seongsan were elevated to the status of townships giving the administrative area one city, two counties, seven townships, six districts and, within Jeju-si, 17 wards.


title: Jeju Province

text: In 1981, the development of the Jungmun Tourist Complex brought about the unification of Seogwi township and Jungmun-myeon (district) into one as Seogwipo-si consisting of 12 wards (dong) giving the province two cities, two counties, six townships, five districts and 29 wards. On October 1, 1983, Jeju-si's Samdo ward was divided into two wards to give a total of 30 wards in the province.


title: Jeju Province

text: Yongdam ward in Jeju-si was restructured into Yongdam ward one and Yongdam ward two on October 1, 1985. On April 1, 1986, Jocheon myeon (district) was elevated to the status of Township and Yeonpyeong-ri Gujwa township was raised to the status of Udo district (myeon). The provincial area now administered 2 cities, 2 counties, 7 townships, 5 districts and 31 wards, the status of the province as of December 3, 1996.


title: Jeju Province

text: Until 2005, Jeju Province was divided into two cities ("si"), Jeju and Seogwipo, and two counties ("gun"), Bukjeju (North Jeju), and Namjeju (South Jeju), respectively. The two cities were further divided into thirty-one neighborhoods ("dong"). In contrast, the two counties were split into seven towns ("eup") and five districts ("myeon"). The seven cities and five districts were then divided into 551 villages ("ri").


title: Jeju Province

text: In 2005, Jeju residents approved, by referendum, a proposal to merge Bukjeju County into Jeju City, and Namjeju County into Seogwipo City. Effective July 1, 2006, the province was also renamed Jeju Special Self-Governing Province with two minor subdivisions, Jeju City and Seogwipo City. In addition to the changes in name, the province was given extensive administrative powers that had previously been reserved for the central government. This is part of a plans to turn Jeju into a "Free International City."


title: Jeju Province

text: In Korean, "do" is the phonetic transcription of two distinct "hanja" (Chinese characters) meaning "island" (島) and "province" (道). However, Jejudo generally refers to the island, while Jeju-do refers to the government administrative unit. The table below also includes the name of Jeju City, the provincial capital.


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju is represented by 3 constituencies in the National Assembly of South Korea: Jeju-gap, Jeju-eul (in Jeju City) and Seogwipo.


title: Jeju Province

text: Because of the relative isolation of the island, the Jeju people have developed a culture and language that are distinct from those of mainland Korea. Jeju is home to thousands of local legends. Perhaps the most distinct cultural artifact is the ubiquitous "dol hareubang" ("stone grandfather") carved from a block of basalt.


title: Jeju Province

text: Another distinct aspect of Jeju is the matriarchal family structure, found especially in Udo and Mara, but also present in the rest of the province. The best-known example of this is found among the "haenyeo" ("sea women"), who were often the heads of families, because they controlled the income. They earned their living from freediving, often all year round in quite cold water without scuba gear, in order to harvest abalones, conches, and a myriad of other marine products. It is thought that women are better at spending all day deep-water diving because they resist the cold better. In the early 1960s, 21% of women on the island were free divers, providing 60% of the island's fisheries revenue. However, because of rapid economic development and modernization, only about 4,500 haenyeo, most aged over 60, were still actively working.


title: Jeju Province

text: Bangsatap are small, round towers made of many stones. There are many Bangsataps and they are visible in the countryside in Jeju. People usually pile up many stones, making a shape like a tower in order to protect themselves from bad luck in their village. They built Bangsatap according to the theory of divination because they believe that geography is very important in choosing the right place for them. It is also a good example to demonstrate religious belief in Jeju island because it is an object in which people put faith: people put a rice paddle inside the Bangsatap to gather as much money as possible, as well as an iron pot to overcome disaster and fight fire in their village. Nobody knows that when the Bangsatap was built over the year previous.


title: Jeju Province

text: In June 2007, Gangjeong, a village on the southern coast of the island, was selected as the site of a controversial $970 million naval base. Villagers have protested and filed lawsuits to try to block construction and have widely publicized their opposition.


title: Jeju Province

text: According to the census of 2005, of the people of Jeju 32.7% follow Buddhism and 17.5% follow Christianity (10.3% Protestantism and 7.2% Catholicism). 49.8% of the population is mostly not religious or follows Korean Shamanism.


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju Island served as one of the host cities of the 2002 FIFA World Cup, with matches hosted at Jeju World Cup Stadium. Jeju City hosted the AIBA 2014 Women's World Boxing Championships at the Halla Gymnasium.


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju United is the only professional sports club on Jeju-do. Jeju United was runner-up in the K League in 2010. Jeju-do has a famous high-school association football tournament that began in 1971.


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju Island is the southernmost and largest island isolated from the Korean peninsula. Due to its lack of fresh water, paddy farming is only done on a small scale, with the cultivation of cereal crops such as millet, barnyard millet, buckwheat, and barley being the main feature of agriculture. Therefore, the traditional Jeju meal generally consists of "japgokbap", which is a bowl of steamed multiple grains as a main dish, with salted dried fish called "jaban" as banchan (side dishes), and a soup based on "doenjang" (soybean paste) such as "baechuguk" made with Napa cabbage, "kongnipguk" made with soybean leaves, or "muguk" made with radish. Jeju dishes are made with simple ingredients, and the taste is generally salty


title: Jeju Province

text: Raw seafood called "hoe" is commonly consumed as a part of the meal. The warm weather affects Jeju cuisine in that "gimjang", preparing kimchi in late autumn for winter consumption, is not necessary to Jeju, as it is in the other provinces. Only a small amount of kimchi is pickled by Jeju locals. Representative main dishes in Jeju cuisine are porridge made with fish, seafood, seaweed, or mushrooms. Examples include "jeonbokjuk" made with abalone, "okdomjuk" made with red tilefish, "gejuk" made with crabs, "gingijuk" made with small crabs called "bangge" ("Helice tridens"), "maeyeoksae juk" made with young miyeok (미역) (wakame), and "chogijuk" made with shiitake.


title: Jeju Province

text: Gamgyul is a type of orange similar to the Mandarin orange or tangerine, commonly harvested in Jeju island. Black pig is a delicacy on the island as well. Black pigs are famous for their black hair and their meat for its chewy texture. The meat is nutritious and does not have the unique smell of pork. Black pigs' other notable features are their long faces, narrow snouts and small ears that stand up. Horse meat is also a delicacy of the island.


title: Jeju Province

text: Within the Jeju province, numerous mythological tales and legends remain particularly prevalent; these are encompassed by the word "yetmal" (, means ‘old language’), responsible for conveying the entirety of the substance of a myth or folk tale, which, within the large majority of instances, occurs within the form of a proverb or philosophical statement. The aforementioned stories remain disseminated within the form of prose between speaker and listener, constituting oral tradition; each story contains a component of truth derived from events within the Jeju province. A. This fictional story could be oral literature but in the eye of ideological aspect, the story also becomes a philosophy. These stories may be classified as proverbs, philosophical statements or folklore derived from the history of the island.


title: Jeju Province

text: The characteristics of the stories of Jeju Province can be found within the form of natural and historical legend; for instance, within the "Ahunahopgol" legend (, means ’legend of 99 Valleys’), historical circumstances responsible for a lack of individuals with talent within leadership remains displayed, expressing the geometrical destiny perspective. The historical legends of the province generally concerned an individual of particular strength; however, the limitations of the island remain represented within the form of the alternative to the hero, the starving strong man. A primary example remains the "malmurlee" legend (, ‘head of horse’); This kind of story shows the limit of the people of the province, with the primary character remaining born as a strong hero as previously listed, yet remaining incapable of overcoming historical isolation.


title: Jeju Province

text: A particular example of mythology within the province remains the myth of "Seolmundae Halmang", well known within Jeju; according to this myth, Seolmundae Halmang ("Grandmother Seolmundae") could reach from Seongsan Ilchulbong ("Sunrise Peak", a volcanic tuff cone on the seaboard of Jeju Island) to Guan Tal island at Aewol-eup in a single stride and to Mount Halla within 2 strides. She was very strong, possessed 500 children and built Mount Halla with seven scoops of earth. One day, Seolmundae Halmang was making soup for her sons while they were out hunting; while they were gone, she fell into the pot and drowned. On their return, they hungrily ate the soup, without knowing that it contained their mother; however, the youngest son knew, informing the remainder of the family, with the entirety of the family crying and transforming into 500 stones.


title: Jeju Province

text: The Jeju economy has traditionally been supported by primary industry, agriculture and fishing, but tourism has taken a more and more important role as the island receives ten million visitors per year. These are mostly Korean mainlanders but through the opening of the 2010 decade hundreds of thousands of Chinese tourists have been arriving and the number is increasing.


title: Jeju Province

text: In 2006, the GDP of the province was projected at 8.5 trillion won (about US$8.5 billion), approximately 15 million won per capita. The provincial government's budget for 2006 was projected at 1.1 trillion won, an increase of 10% over 2005.


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju is also a home for key functions of Daum Communications, a leading Korean internet site, and sole owner of Lycos until August 2010.


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju is also famous for hosting many conferences and international meetings, including the World Scout Conference in July 2008. Jeju has its own international convention center called ICC Jeju. The ASEAN-KOREA Commemorative Summit 2009 was held at ICC Jeju.


title: Jeju Province

text: In 2010, the South Korean federal government tasked Jeju Island to develop itself as an international Meetings, Incentives, Conferencing, Exhibitions destination, and since then, the island has hosted a number of notable events such as the 10,000-passenger China Baozhen Group incentive and 8,000-passenger Amway South Korean incentive. In 2010, the destination welcomed 67 events, enabling it to reach 27th spot globally and seventh in Asia in the UIA ranking of global meetings destinations.


title: Jeju Province

text: Tourism commands a large fraction of Jeju's economy. Jeju's temperate climate, natural scenery, and beaches make it a popular tourist destination for South Koreans as well as visitors from other parts of East Asia. The most popular tourist spots on the island are Cheonjeyeon and Cheonjiyeon waterfalls, Mount Halla, Hyeobje cave, and Hyeongje island. There is a variety of leisure sports that tourists can take part in Jeju including golf, horse riding, hunting, fishing, mountain climbing, etc. Depending on the season, Jeju hosts many festivals for tourists including a penguin swimming contest in winter, cherry blossom festival in spring, the midsummer night beach festival in summer, and Jeju horse festival in autumn, among others. For most tourists, traffic to and from the island is mainly taken through Jeju International Airport and transport within the island by rental cars. Some local products are popular with tourists, including Jeju's special tile fish and mandarin oranges, as well as souvenirs and duty-free shopping.


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju was chosen as one of the New 7 Wonders of Nature through the New 7 Wonders of Nature campaign by the New7Wonders Foundation. The campaign saw hundreds of millions of votes and the top seven wonders were announced on 11/11/11.


title: Jeju Province

text: Hallim Park is one of the oldest and most popular tourist attractions on Jeju. It is on the west coast.


title: Jeju Province

text: There is an annual fire festival on the island that stems from a custom of removing harmful insects and old grass in villages in winter. The fire festival is held on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month. Dal-gip (to pile up much wood) is burned when the moon rises while praying for good harvests and making good wishes. Jeju traditional food is eaten at the site of the festival. This festival was held 13 times until 2009. The "Jeju Jeongwol Daeboreum Fire Festival" started in 1997 and become a leading festival of Jeju. This takes place in Saebyeol Oreum in Bongseong ri, Aewol Eup. It takes up to 25 minutes to reach it from Jeju International Airport by car. Jeju citizens do their utmost to prepare the Fire Festival so as to pass down, develop, and ultimately develop branding for the unique folk culture resources of Jeju.


title: Jeju Province

text: Saebyeol oreum has a characteristic of a complex volcano. It has a horseshoe-shaped crater that is both very wide and slightly split. It rises high with the little peaks making an oval from the south peak to northwest. The scale is above sea level , height of , circumference of , area of . Saebyeol oreum is the middle size among the 360 oreums on Jeju island. It is named after the saying "it brightens like a star."


title: Jeju Province

text: The Jeju Olle Trail, called Jeju Olle Gil or simply "jejuolle" in Korean, is a long-distance footpath on Jeju Island. The course, mostly following the coastline, consists of 21 connected, numbered main courses, 5 major spurs, and a short spur that connects to Jeju Airport. The courses have an average length of and all together total . The exact length and locations change over time as trails are modified or re-routed.


title: Jeju Province

text: The courses pass through small villages, cross beaches, wind through farms and orchards, twist through forests, and climb oreums ("low parasitic volcanoes") across Jeju Island.


title: Jeju Province

text: Manjanggul is one of the longest lava tubes in the world. Manjang Cave, at Donggimnyeong-ri, Gujwa-eup, North Jeju, east of Jeju City, was designated as Natural Monument No. 98 on March 28, 1970. The annual temperature inside the cave ranges from 11℃ to 21℃, thus facilitating a favorable environment throughout the year.


title: Jeju Province

text: The cave is academically significant as rare species live in the cave. Created by spewing lava, "the lava turtle", "lava pillar", and "wing-shaped wall" look like the work of the gods. It is considered to be a world-class tourist attraction.


title: Jeju Province

text: The Geomunoreum lava tube system is the most impressive and significant series of protected lava tubes in the world and includes a spectacular array of secondary carbonate speleothems (stalactites and other formations). It overwhelms other lava tubes with its abundance and diversity. The Geomunoreum lava tube system, which is regarded as the finest such cave system in the world, has an outstanding visual impact even for those experienced with such phenomena. It displays the unique spectacle of multi-colored carbonate decorations adorning the roofs and floors, and dark-colored lava walls, partially covered by a mural of carbonate deposits.


title: Jeju Province

text: In addition, lava tubes are like those in limestone karst in scale, shape, and internal decoration, but completely different in origin. Lava tubes are known from basaltic terrain in most of the world's volcanic regions. The lava tubes of the Geomunoreum system are, however, regarded as internationally important due to their length, massive volume, intricate passage configuration, well preserved internal lava features, abundant and spectacular secondary carbonate formations, ease of access, and their scientific and educational values. Another feature making Geomunoreum globally significant and distinctive is the presence of carbonate deposits and formations. Very small deposits of calcite are common in lava tubes and are more significantly developed as speleothems in Duck Creek cave in the U.S. state of Utah. However, in abundance, density and diversity they are far less impressive than those of Yongcheongul and Dangcheomuldonggul lava tubes in Jeju, and the scale of these decorations within the lava caves of Jeju Island far exceeds any other comparable examples. The nomination is supported by the Commission on Volcanic Caves of the International Union of Speleology — the world's most authoritative scientific body on volcanic caves — which regards Jeju's lava caves as being of the highest international ranking. Yongcheon Gul Lava Tube has been discovered subsequently and is of equivalent value.


title: Jeju Province

text: Sangumburi Crater is the crater of an extinct volcano. Unlike its brethren Halla-san and Songsan Ilch'ubong, this one exploded quickly but did not spew much lava nor did it form much of a surrounding cone. This phenomenon is called maru in Korean, and Sangumburi is the only one of its kind in the country, making it Natural Monument #263. The remaining crater is deep and an average of s across. Over 400 species of plants and animals live inside the crater.


title: Jeju Province

text: Visitors can walk around part of the rim (the rest is private property and fenced off), but they cannot venture down inside the crater. A well-paved path leads from the parking area to the viewing area, which has a small pavilion and several vista points. Also on the grounds are gravesites made in traditional Jeju fashion: a wide, trapezoidal stone wall surrounding the burial mound. Several of the sites have small stone figures that guard the mound against evil spirits. At the park entrance are large rocks from the crater. During the eruption, molten rock flew from the volcano into the air and cooled into many exotic shapes.


title: Jeju Province

text: Seongsan Ilchulbong, also called ‘Sunrise Peak’, is an archetypal tuff cone formed by hydrovolcanic eruptions upon a shallow seabed about 5,000 years ago. On the eastern seaboard of Jeju Island and said to resemble a gigantic ancient castle, this tuff cone is 182 meters high, has a preserved bowl-like crater, and displays diverse inner structures resulting from the sea cliff. These features are considered to be of geologic worth, providing information on eruptive and depositional processes of hydromagnetic volcanoes worldwide as well as past volcanic activity of Seongsan Ilchulbong itself.


title: Jeju Province

text: Oedolgae is a 20-meter-tall pillar-shaped rock in Sammaebong, Seogwipo. It was created 1.5 million years ago by a volcanic eruption. At the top of Oedolgae, there are pine trees growing naturally. According to legend, an old woman became a rock after waiting for her husband who went to sea to catch fish and didn't return for a long time. So people call it 'halmang bawi' meaning grandmother rock. On the left side of Oedolgae, there is a rock called someri bawi. A large grass area covers the rock, and the surrounding area is great for fishing. Oedolgae is a popular tourist destination, particularly with foreigners.


title: Jeju Province

text: Mt. Halla is the mountain of one of the three gods. It stands at the center of Jeju Island, spreading east and west. The east face is steep, the north side is gentle, and the east and west form a flat, wide highland.


title: Jeju Province

text: Mount Halla is a dormant volcano created by volcanic activities during the quaternary period of the Cenozoic era. It is primarily covered with basalt. On its top is a crater and Baeknok Lake. This mountain is home to alpine plants and houses as many as 1,800 species of flora. It also boasts luxuriant natural forests and vast grasslands.


title: Jeju Province

text: The long Road 5.16 crossing the eastern waist of the mountain from Jeju City to Seogwipo City is considered to be one of the best tourist roads in Korea. Along this road, there are many tourist attractions such as Sancheondan and Seongpanak. People can enjoy the royal azalea blossoms in spring, lush, green woods in summer, colorful foliage in fall, and a landscape of snow in winter.


title: Jeju Province

text: The Road 110 crossing the western waist of the mountain from Jeju-si to Jungmun runs through a high area that is high above sea level. It passes by the Eoseungsang Reservoir, which is a source of water for Jeju islanders. The 99 Passes where, a legend says, neither a king nor a tiger is born because it is one short to 100 passes. It also passes closely by Youngsil Giam (Youngsil Grotesque Rocks). It is possible to climb up to Wetse Oreum along Eorimok Trail and Youngsil Trail and to the top along Seongpanak Trail and Kwaneumsa Temple Trail.


title: Jeju Province

text: Udo, (also called U-island, since do means island) is on the northeast of Seongsan-ri, 3.5 kilometres (2.2 miles) off the coast. This is the largest of the islands included in Jeju-si. Udo, literally "Cow Island" in Chinese, has this name because it looks like a cow lying down. The whole of Udo is a lava plateau and a fertile flatland where major agricultural products such as sweet potatoes, garlic, and peanuts are produced. There is a parasitic cone, called "shoi meori oreum", in the southeast.


title: Jeju Province

text: Jungmun Saekdal Beach is at the Saekdal-dong, Seogwipo-si. It is near the hotel zone it has convenient accessibility: Sinla Jeju hotel, Lotte hotel, Jeju Hana hotel are around 2 kilometers near the beach. Jungmun Saekdal Beach has a particular geographical feature. The beach shore is faced to the north and the water level is steady knee height until about 200 meters off the shore. There are many big and small waves under the influences of the Maparam (, which means the wind from the north in Korean) so the beach is clouded by the people who came from many other regions to enjoy surfing in summer.


title: Jeju Province

text: Aqua Planet Jeju　In Seogwipo City, there is the largest public aquarium "Aqua Planet Jeju (아쿠 아플라넷 제주)" in Korea. Korea's largest tank of "The Sea of Jeju" is popular.


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju has an independent visa policy that varies from that of the South Korean mainland. So all ordinary passport holders excluding those from Afghanistan, Cuba, Ghana, Iraq, Kosovo, Libya, Nigeria, Palestine, North Korea, North Macedonia, Sudan, Syria, Somalia and Yemen can stay visa-free 30 days in Jeju, even if they normally require a visa for the South Korean mainland.


title: Jeju Province

text: Domestic flights from the mainland do not require identification; however, passengers who try to enter the mainland from Jeju must bring identification such as National ID Card, Jeju Resident Card, South Korean drivers licence issued by National Police Agency or or passport with proper visa or visa-free passport or passport with valid United States visa.


title: Jeju Province

text: Thus, all ordinary passport holders except the following can stay visa-free 30 days in Jeju Province, even if they normally require a visa for South Korea:


title: Jeju Province

text: Jeju City is the principal transportation center for Jeju Province. It is home to the island's sole airport, Jeju International Airport; the Jeju-Seoul route is the world's busiest airline route.


title: Jeju Province

text: The port of Jeju is the largest on the island, serving the great majority of passenger, cargo, and fishing vessels.


title: Jeju Province

text: In 2019, Jeju Special Self-Governing Province announced the launching of a service focused on public transportation mobile IOT.


title: Jeju Province

text: There are five local newspapers on Jeju Island: the Cheju Daily News, Jeminilbo, Hallailbo, Seogwipo-News, Jejumaeil. The Jeju Weekly is the only print English-language newspaper on the island. JejuWorldWide.com is a daily online news and events Web site that opened in early 2013.


title: Jeju Province

text: TV and radio stations include Jeju Free International City Broadcasting System (an affiliate of SBS), KBS Jeju, and Jeju MBC, and KCTV Jeju.


title: Hunting dog

text: A hunting dog is a canine that hunts with or for hunters. There are several different types of hunting dog developed for various tasks and purposes. The major categories of hunting dog include hounds, terriers, dachshunds, cur type dogs, and gun dogs. Further distinctions within these categories can be made, based upon the dog's skills and capabilities. They are usually larger and have a more sensitive smell than normal dogs.


title: The Quiet American

text: Narrated in the first person by journalist Thomas Fowler, the novel depicts the breakdown of French colonialism in Vietnam and early American involvement in the Vietnam War. A subplot concerns a love triangle between Fowler, an American CIA agent named Alden Pyle, and Phuong, a young Vietnamese woman.


title: The Quiet American

text: The novel implicitly questions the foundations of growing American involvement in Vietnam in the 1950s, exploring the subject through links among its three main characters – Fowler, Pyle and Phuong. The novel has received much attention due to its prediction of the outcome of the Vietnam War and subsequent American foreign policy since the 1950s. Greene portrays Pyle as so blinded by American exceptionalism that he cannot see the calamities he brings upon the Vietnamese. The book uses Greene's experiences as a war correspondent for "The Times" and "Le Figaro" in French Indochina 1951–1954. He was apparently inspired to write "The Quiet American" during October 1951 while driving back to Saigon from Ben Tre province, accompanied by an American aid worker who lectured him about finding a "third force in Vietnam".


title: The Quiet American

text: Thomas Fowler is a British journalist in his fifties who has covered the French war in Vietnam for more than two years. He meets a young American idealist named Alden Pyle, a CIA agent working undercover. Pyle lives his life and forms his opinions based on foreign policy books written by York Harding with no real experience in Southeast Asia matters. Harding's theory is that neither communism nor colonialism are proper in foreign lands like Vietnam, but rather a "Third Force"—usually a combination of traditions—works best. When they first meet, the earnest Pyle asks Fowler to help him understand more about the country, but the older man's cynical realism does not sink in. Pyle is certain that American power can put the Third Force in charge, but he knows little about Indochina and is recasting it into theoretical categories.


title: The Quiet American

text: Fowler has a live-in lover, Phuong, who is only 20 years old and was previously a dancer at The Arc-en-Ciel (Rainbow) on Jaccareo Road, in Cholon. Her sister's intent is to arrange a marriage for Phuong that will benefit herself and her family. The sister disapproves of their relationship, as Fowler is already married and an atheist. So, at a dinner with Fowler and Phuong, Pyle meets her sister, who immediately starts questioning Pyle about his viability for marriage with Phuong. Towards the end of the dinner, Pyle dances with Phuong, and Fowler notes how poorly the upstart dances.


title: The Quiet American

text: Fowler goes to Phat Diem to witness a battle there. Pyle travels there to tell him that he has been in love with Phuong since the first night he saw her, and that he wants to marry her. They make a toast to nothing and Pyle leaves the next day. Fowler gets a letter from Pyle thanking him for being so nice. The letter annoys Fowler because of Pyle's arrogant confidence that Phuong will leave Fowler to marry him. Meanwhile, Fowler's editor wants him to transfer back to England.


title: The Quiet American

text: Pyle comes to Fowler's residence and they ask Phuong to choose between them. She chooses Fowler, unaware that he is pending a transfer. Fowler writes to his wife to ask for a divorce in front of Phuong.


title: The Quiet American

text: Fowler and Pyle meet again in a war zone. They end up in a guard tower where they discuss topics ranging from sexual experiences to religion. Their presence endangers the local guards by attracting an attack by the Viet Minh. These indigenous auxiliaries simply want to live their lives, but they are doomed by their contact with foreign intrigue. Pyle saves Fowler's life as they escape. Fowler goes back to Saigon, where he lies to Phuong that his wife will divorce him. Pyle exposes the lie and Phuong must choose between him and Fowler. Like a small country caught between imperial rivals, Phuong considers her own interests realistically and without sentiment. She moves in with Pyle. After receiving a letter from Fowler, his editor decides that he can stay in Indo-China for another year. Fowler goes into the midst of the battlefield to witness events.


title: The Quiet American

text: When Fowler returns to Saigon, he goes to Pyle's office to confront him, but Pyle is out. Pyle comes over later for drinks and they talk about his pending marriage to Phuong. Later that week, a car bomb is detonated and many innocent civilians are killed. Fowler realizes that Pyle was involved. Pyle had allied himself with General Thé, a renegade commander he was grooming to lead the "Third Force" described in Harding's book. Pyle thus brings disaster upon innocents, all the while certain he is bringing a third way to Vietnam. Fowler is emotionally conflicted about this discovery, but ultimately decides to aid in the assassination of Pyle. Though the police suspect that Fowler is involved, they cannot prove anything. Phuong goes back to Fowler as if nothing had ever happened. In the last chapter, Fowler receives a telegram from his wife in which she states that she has changed her mind and will begin divorce proceedings. The novel ends with Fowler thinking about his first meeting with, and the death of, Pyle.


title: The Quiet American

text: Thomas Fowler is a British journalist in his fifties who has been covering the French war in Vietnam for more than two years. He has become a very jaded and cynical man. He meets Alden Pyle and finds him naïve. Throughout the book Fowler is often caught in lies and sometimes there may be speculation that he is lying to himself. Fowler's relationship with Vietnamese woman Phuong often intensifies the conflict of the story, especially between Fowler and Pyle.


title: The Quiet American

text: Alden Pyle is the "quiet American" of the title. A CIA agent working undercover, Pyle is thoughtful, soft-spoken, intellectual, serious, and idealistic. He comes from a privileged East Coast background. His father is a renowned professor of underwater erosion whose picture has appeared on the cover of "Time" magazine; his mother is well respected in their community. Pyle is a brilliant graduate of Harvard University. He has studied theories of government and society, and is particularly devoted to a scholar named York Harding. Harding's theory is that neither Communism nor colonialism is the answer in foreign lands like Vietnam, but rather a "Third Force", usually a combination of traditions, works best. Pyle has read Harding's numerous books many times and has adopted Harding's thinking as his own. Pyle also strives to be a member of this "Third Force". US military counter-insurgency expert Edward Lansdale, who was stationed in Vietnam 1953–1957, is sometimes cited as a model for Pyle's character. In fact Greene did not meet Lansdale until after completing much of the novel. According to Greene, the inspiration for the character of Pyle was Leo Hochstetter, an American serving as public affairs director for the Economic Aid Mission in Indochina who was assumed by the French to “belong to the CIA,” and lectured him on the “long drive back to Saigon on the necessity of finding a ‘third force in Vietnam.’”


title: The Quiet American

text: Phuong, Fowler's lover at the beginning of the novel, is a beautiful young Vietnamese woman who stays with him for security and protection, and leaves him for the same reason. She is considered by Fowler as a lover to be taken for granted and by Pyle as someone to be protected. Pyle's desire for Phuong was largely interpreted by critics to parallel his desire for a non-Americanised South Vietnam. Her character is never fully developed or revealed. She is never able to show her emotions, as her older sister makes decisions for her. She is named after, but not based on, a Vietnamese friend of Greene's.


title: The Quiet American

text: Vigot, a French inspector at the Sûreté, investigates Pyle's death. He is a man anguished between doing his duty (pursuing Pyle's death and questioning Fowler) and doing what is best for the country (letting the matter be unsolved). He and Fowler are oddly akin in some ways, both faintly cynical and weary of the world; hence their discussion of Blaise Pascal. But they are divided by the differences of their faith: Vigot is a Roman Catholic and Fowler an atheist.


title: The Quiet American

text: The novel was popular in England and over the years has achieved notable status, being adapted into films in 1958 and most recently in 2002 by Miramax, featuring Michael Caine and Brendan Fraser and earning the former a Best Actor nomination. However, after its publication in the United States in 1956, the novel was widely condemned as anti-American. It was criticised by "The New Yorker" for portraying Americans as murderers, largely based on one scene in which a bomb explodes in a crowd of people. According to critic Philip Stratford, "American readers were incensed, perhaps not so much because of the biased portrait of obtuse and destructive American innocence and idealism in Alden Pyle, but because in this case it was drawn with such acid pleasure by a middle-class English snob like Thomas Fowler whom they were all too ready to identify with Greene himself". The title of a 1958 book, "The Ugly American", was a play on Greene's title; however, authors Eugene Burdick and William Lederer thoroughly misunderstood the novel as their book argued that the American diplomatic corps needed to be more modern, technically proficient, and friendly in assisting Third World countries—some of the exact qualities that blinded Alden Pyle. French journalist Jean-Claude Pomonti's 2006 book about South Vietnamese correspondent and Viet Cong spy Phạm Xuân Ẩn was titled "Un Vietnamien bien tranquille" ["The Quiet Vietnamese"]. In 2021 another book of a similar name by Scott Anderson "The Quiet Americans: Four CIA Spies at the Dawn of the Cold War—A Tragedy in Three parts" which described CIA operators during the Cold War was published. This book title too was a play on the title of Greene's book, although the themes about spycraft were different.


title: The Quiet American

text: On November 5, 2019, the "BBC News" listed "The Quiet American" on its list of the 100 most influential novels.