The Royal House of Savoy marked the millennium of its founding in 2003. Its origins date back to an historical figure living in 1003, Humbert "the Whitehanded," whose success in establishing himself as a powerful ruler in the region of Savoy (today a part of France), created the foundation upon which his descendants would continue to expand for the next ten centuries. The dynasty's ultimate achievement was the unification of the Italian peninsula under its rule in 1861.

     Prior to 1946, the Savoys were one of Europe's oldest reigning houses, related to almost every royal house of Europe. Successive heads of the dynasty rose from Counts to Dukes of Savoy, a region comprising territories now part of Switzerland, France and northern Italy. In 1713, they became Kings of Sicily and assumed the dignity of Majesty. Thereafter, the Sicilian crown was exchanged for that of Sardinia in 1718, and the Savoy dynasty ruled the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont. In 1861, King Victor Emmanuel II led the movement for Italian unification, ceding Savoy to France in the process, and he and his descendants reigned as sovereigns of a united Italy until 1946.