Ruler of self-declared principality on the Italian Riviera faces 'coup d'etat' from rival

[Recursion]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/21/ruler-of-self-declared-principality-on-the-italian-riviera-faces/

I love everything about this story

Seborga is a hilltop village overlooking the Italian Riviera that for half a century has proclaimed itself a self-governing principality, independent of the rest of Italy.

Locals insist that when it was sold in 1729 to the Savoy dynasty, the deal was not registered properly, so that when Italy was unified in 1861, Seborga was left in a legal twilight zone, belonging to no state.

For the last six years the village of 320 inhabitants has been ‘ruled’ by Marcello Menegatto, 37, a businessman who styles himself His Tremendousness Marcello I, along with his wife, Princess Nina, who is originally from Germany.

...

But the peace and tranquility of the five-square-mile kingdom, which lies close to the French border, has been upset by a challenge from a pretender to the throne, a Frenchman called Nicolas Mutte who has given himself the title of His Serene Highness Nicolas I.

[Scootaloo]

1. Well, those Europeans have been fighting themselves for thousands of years. What can you do?

[rug]

2. His Tremendousness will fight dirtier than His Serene Highness.

[Person 2713]

3. Love it