Vittorio Emanuele di Savoia has died. And now what happens? «I feel like the new head of the family first of all, and at the head of a House that when grandfather Umberto II died was reduced to 30 knights of our dynastic orders. Then dad managed to bring the knights to over three thousand, and to give vigor to the activity of the dynastic Orders». This is explained by Emanuele Filiberto di Savoia in an interview with Corriere della Sera after his father's death. «This is the first responsibility and inheritance he leaves me: to lead our Orders which have dozens of delegations in Italy, 17 foreign delegations and are active with humanitarian projects all over the world. But now there is the funeral to prepare», he adds.
The funeral of the son of the last King of Italy will be held in Turin and the burial will take place in Superga. «Dad always wanted it to be like this, his end, he repeated it and I will fulfill his last wish. Even if it is not easy, we expect a lot of people at the mass, you can only access by invitation - he continues -. That's why the rite will not be in Superga where then the close family will bring the body for the final farewell, but in the Cathedral in Turin. The lying in state at the Venaria Reale, from Friday in the chapel of Sant'Uberto to give those who want to say goodbye to dad Vittorio Emanuele the chance to do so».
Emanuele Filiberto tells Corriere about his father's suffering in the last days. «We were all in the mountains in our house in Gstaad and then a bad infection in dad's leg required hospitalization where the antibiotics had an effect on the infection but weakened his body, his heart and the vital organs of an 87-year-old man - he concludes -. I am receiving messages from all over the world, from the royals of Spain to those of Belgium, of Monaco, also from Iran, from the family of the Shah of Persia, as from common people because dad was always the same, generous, at hand with the nobles close to the Savoias as with the common people».
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