Representatives of European royal families, including the king and queen of Spain, on Monday attended the funeral service at the Athens Metropolitan Cathedral for former Princess Irene of Greece, ahead of her burial in a former royal estate outside Athens.
Irene, 83, who died on Thursday in Spain, was the third child of the former king of Greece, Pavlos. She was to be buried at the Tatoi estate beside her parents, Pavlos and Frederica, and her brother, former King Constantine II, who died in 2023.
The funeral service was attended by Irene’s sister, Queen Sofia of Spain, as well as Spain’s King Felipe VI, his wife Letizia with their daughters, and her nephews Pavlos, Nikolaos and Philip, the sons of Greece’s former King Constantine II. Earlier, Irene’s body lay in state at the Chapel of Agios Eleftherios, next to the Athens Metropolitan Cathedral.
Born in Cape Town, South Africa, on May 11 1942, Princess Irene was a pianist and archaeologist – as well as briefly the heir to the Greek throne – and dedicated much of her life to spiritual and humanitarian work. She spent her later years between Greece and Spain, living permanently in Spain after 2018.
[Intime News]