Grand Duke Jean of Luxembourg Is Dead at 98

His eldest son and the current head of state, the Grand Duke Henri, confirmed his father’s death, at a hospital, where he had been admitted 10 days earlier for treatment of a lung infection.

“It is a family man who has left us today,” Prime Minister Xavier Bettel said in a statement Tuesday. “A great statesman, a hero, a role model — and a lovely and kindhearted man.”

Jean took the throne when his mother, Grand Duchess Charlotte, abdicated in 1964. He, in turn, abdicated in favor of Henri in 2000.

He was the eighth sovereign of Luxembourg, a small, landlocked country that was founded in 1815, sharing borders with Belgium, France and Germany. It is the only grand duchy in the world. The constitutional role of head of state is largely ceremonial.

Luxembourg saw unprecedented levels of growth during Grand Duke Jean’s reign. From the mid-1980s to 2000 its average rate of growth of gross domestic product outpaced that of most other European countries. It is one of the wealthiest countries in the world in terms of gross domestic product per capita.

During Jean’s reign the country moved from being a center of steel manufacturing to being a hub of financial services.

“He is the one who embodied the modernization of the country,” said Michel Wurth, a member of the board of directors of ArcelorMittal, the world’s largest steel-maker, which has its headquarters in Luxembourg. “It was under his reign that Luxembourg became a European capital.”

And, Wurth said, “He was very close to his people.”

Jean Benoît Guillaume Robert Antoine Louis Marie Adolphe Marc d’Aviano was born Jan. 5, 1921, at the Colmar-Berg Castle in Luxembourg, the eldest child of Charlotte and Prince Félix of Bourbon-Parma.

As the crown prince, he fled Luxembourg with the grand ducal family after Germany invaded the country in May 1940 and found refuge in France, Portugal, the United States and Canada before moving to Britain to join the Irish Guards, a regiment of the British army, as a private in 1942.

He participated in the Allies’ D-Day landings in Normandy and fought in the Battle for Caen there. Three months later he took part in the liberation of Brussels.

Among other honors, he received a Silver Star from the United States, a War Medal from Britain and the French Croix de Guerre. He was promoted to colonel in the Irish Guards in 1984 and was made an honorary general of the British army in 1995.

Jean married Princess Joséphine-Charlotte of Belgium at Luxembourg Cathedral on April 9, 1953. In addition to Henri, they had four other children: Marie-Astrid, Jean, Margaretha and Guillaume. Josephine-Charlotte died in 2005 at 77. A complete list of survivors was not immediately available.

Jean mostly kept out of the public eye after his wife’s death. In a documentary film made in 2014 and shown on RTL, a national broadcaster, Henri said his father had taken up painting.

“He is painting trees, nature, and we all received little souvenirs from him, little tableaus,” Henri said.

Jean became an honorary member of the International Olympic Committee in 1998 and was a keen amateur sportsman who took part in fencing, swimming, skiing, horse riding and tennis. He was also chief scout of the Luxembourg Boy Scouts Association.

He made his first official visit to the United States in 1984, becoming the first head of state to be received by President Ronald Reagan after his re-election.

A statement by the White House on Tuesday called Jean “a great friend of the United States.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.