02 April 2011

King and czar. Or is it czar and king?

Czar Nicholas II of Russia and King George V of England. Their portraits appear on many postage stamps and it is difficult to distinguish between the two men. Can you pick who’s who from this photo?
There's a 50:50 chance you're wrong - and if you're really smart (and observant, and knowledgeable re clothing and style), then you're even more likely to get it wrong, for a reason posted with the answer at The Ornamented Being.

Via My Ear-Trumpet Has Been Struck by Lightning.

9 comments:

  1. It was not hard to guess which is which - if you have ever seen a picture of Nicholas (ie taken a high school history class) it is obvious which is he. His face is unmistakable I had never see George before though - so thanks for the good picture, I'll remember it in the future.

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  2. I was right...mostly because the Tzar's outfit looks warmer.

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  3. ...and you do understand that they switched outfits for the photo?

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  4. I went by the resemblance between George V and his sons. I'm always struck by how much George VI's great-grandson, Prince William, looks like him, despite the male Windsor looks having passed his father, Prince Charles, by. (Prince Harry didn't get 'em either.)

    --Swift Loris

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  5. Well, the fur on the left says Russian and the small St. George's Cross on the right says British, but they might have been sneaky and switched clothing!

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  6. I've seen a lot of photos of both men, so it is cheating.

    Nicholas II is a saint in the Orthodox Church, I like to kid British friends that icons of him are of George V.

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  7. I kept looking and looking at the uniforms, but couldn't really get anything from them so I looked at their faces. This may be really silly, but I thought the King's face just 'looked' British - the eyes were wider open and the nose looked like a blend of all the guys from Monty Python.

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  8. I have seen enough pictures of Nicholas over the years that I immediately pegged him as the one on the left.

    George I knew was almost identical to him, but had not really ever seen a good photo of him. In seeing this, I can see the close resemblance, but I also knew that the face on the right was not Nicholas..

    I do think it is hilarious that they switched clothing.

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