Sophia of Nassau had married the future…

Sophia of Nassau had married the future King Oscar II of Sweden–Norway on June 6, 1857, at the Castle in Wiesbaden-Biebrich.

Received with great enthusiasm upon her arrival in Stockholm on June 19, Sophia is seen as the solution of the succession problem and future Queen, since the current Crown Princess Louise had become sterile after delivering her last child, and the elder brother of Oscar, Crown Prince Charles, has no son and his daughter is not accepted as heir to the throne under the present constitution.

She is the youngest daughter of Wilhelm, Duke of Nassau, by his second wife Princess Pauline Friederica Marie of Württemberg.

Her father died when she was three and was succeeded by her half-brother Adolphe, Grand Duke of Luxembourg.

Sophia has been given what is considered a suitable education for princesses at this time by private tutors.

She has trained in fencing, a sport normally reserved for males, to strengthen her back and correct her posture.

Sophia socializes with academics and artists, and the court of Nassau is considered more democratic than what is usual at most German courts.

She learns the English language early on and feels sympathy for the British parliamentarian system.

The language spoken in her childhood home was not German but English.

She is described as serious, intelligent and dutiful, and interested in language and history: she is also genuinely religious.