It takes its name from its oldest domain, the Ernestine duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, and its members later sat on the thrones of Belgium, Bulgaria, Portugal, and the United Kingdom and its dominions.

In 1917, the First World War caused the British king George V to officially change the name from "Saxe-Coburg and Gotha" to "Windsor" in the United Kingdom.

Prince Albert thus is the progenitor of the United Kingdom's current royal family, called the House of Windsor since 1917.

[4] In 1826, a cadet branch of the house inherited the Hungarian princely estate of the Koháry family and converted to Roman Catholicism.

In 1893, the reigning duke Ernest II died childless, whereupon the throne would have devolved, by male primogeniture, upon the descendants of his brother Prince Albert.

Therefore, the German duchy became a secundogeniture, hereditary among the younger princes of the British royal family who belonged to the House of Wettin, and their male-line descendants.

It was founded with the marriage of Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, second son of Francis, Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, with Princess Maria Antonia Koháry de Csábrág.

[citation needed] Because of the First World War, the title of the family was unofficially changed in 1920 or 1921 to "of Belgium",[10][11] and the armorial bearings of Saxony were removed from the Belgian royal coat of arms.

The British line was founded by King Edward VII, eldest son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.

His successor and son, King George V, changed the name of this line of the royal house and family to Windsor.