Windsor (British royal family)

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Windsor (wĬn´zər), family name of the royal house of Great Britain. The name Wettin, family name of Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, consort of Queen Victoria, was changed to Windsor by George V in 1917. The new name was adopted by all members of the family. In 1952, Queen Elizabeth II, who married Philip Mountbatten, duke of Edinburgh, decreed that she and her descendants (other than females who marry) should retain the name Windsor. A declaration of 1960, however, restricted the name to those descendants bearing the title prince or princess (i.e., the sovereign's children, the children of the sovereign's sons, and the eldest son of the eldest son of the prince of Wales); all other descendants are to be known as Mountbatten-Windsor.