ABSTRACT
This chapter examines dinner guests at the court in the years 1835, 1855, 1869, and 1888, which takes into account different periods within the reign of both the first king of the Belgians, Leopold I, and the second king, Leopold II, and consequently enables a comparison between two distinct eras. It will analyze the figuration of the king and queen's dinner guests making use of the technique of Social Network Analysis (SNA). In 1875, Leopold's son, Leopold II, the second king of the Belgians, arranged the marriage of his 17-year old daughter Louise to a member of the Hungarian branch of the Coburg family. With this marriage, the Belgian court became connected to the Habsburg Empire; it already had family ties to Queen Victoria. It may seem somewhat masochistic for a historian to commence an argument by referring to sociologist Norbert Elias's The Court Society.
