19 Thursday May 2022
Posted in From the Emperor's Desk, Uncategorized
Hello my wonderful readers! My tablet died on the 8th of May. After having to return one and now my new came today I’m taking a little more time off and will return to blogging on Monday the 23rd!
Thanks for your patience!
Liam
Today is the anniversary of the birth of Emperor Nicholas II of Russia, scene here with his first cousin King George V of the United Kingdom
19 Tuesday Apr 2022
Tags
Archduchess Marie Henriette of Austria, Archduke Joseph of Austria-Hungary, King Leopold I of Belgium, King Leopold II of Belgium, King Louis Philippe of the French, Louise of Orléans, Queen Maria II of Portugal, Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom
From the Emperor’s Desk: Generally on the blog I post biographical information of a royal person on the anniversary of their birth or death or marriage. While I will continue this practice I will also begin to post biographies of Royal persons randomly without any relation to an anniversary.
Both in the biographical posts on the birth, death or marriage anniversaries, as well as the random biographies, I will focus on just a portion of their lives since writing the entirety of their lives does take several days and many posts. I will also be including more topical posts in the future.
So here is a random biography
Archduchess Marie Henriette of Austria (August 23, 1836 – September 19, 1902) was Queen of the Belgians as the wife of King Leopold II. The marriage was arranged against the will of both Marie Henriette and Leopold and became unhappy due to their dissimilarity, and after 1872 the couple lived separate lives, though they continued to appear together in public.
Queen Marie Henriette was described as an energetic and intelligent horsewoman, foremost devoted to her animals. In 1895, she openly retired from public life and lived her last seven years in the city of Spa, where she became known as “The Queen of Spa”.
Archduchess Marie Henriette of Austria was one of five children from the marriage of Archduke Joseph of Austria, Palatine of Hungary, and Duchess Maria Dorothea of Württemberg.
Archduchess Marie Henriette was a cousin of Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria, and granddaughter of Holy Roman Emperor Leopold II through her father. She was also a first cousin, once removed to Mary of Teck, the future Queen Mary of the United Kingdom (wife of King George V) through her mother.
Her father was Palatine of Hungary, and she spent a great deal of her childhood in the Buda Castle in Hungary. She lost her father at the age of ten. After her father’s death, she became a ward of Archduke Johann of Austria at the Palais Augarten in Vienna. It was said that she was raised by her mother “as a boy”. Marie Henriette was a vivid and energetic person with a strong will and a hot temperament, interested in riding.
Marriage
One day before her 17th birthday, she married 18-year-old Prince Leopold of Belgium, the heir to the throne, on August 22, 1853. Leopold was the second-surviving son of Leopold I of Belgium and his French wife, Louise of Orléans; the eldest daughter of the future Louis-Philippe I, King of the French, and of his wife Maria Amalia of the Two Sicilies.
Marie Henriette was the sister-in-law of Charlotte of Belgium, future Empress of Mexico via Charlotte’s husband and Marie Henriette’s cousin, Archduke Maximilian of Austria, (brother of Emperor Franz Joseph of Austria-Hungary) and a cousin by marriage to both Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom and Queen Maria II of Portugal.
The marriage was arranged to strengthen the status of the Belgian Monarchy. As the former Protestant monarch of a newly established monarchy, the Belgian king Leopold I wished his son to marry a member from a Roman Catholic and prestigious dynasty, and the name Habsburg was one of her more important qualities. The marriage further more created an historical link between the new Kingdom of Belgium and the Habsburg dynasty of the Austrian Netherlands.
The marriage was suggested by her future father-in-law the king of Belgium to her guardian, the Archduke Johann of Austria, and arranged by the two men over her head.
She was introduced to Leopold on an Imperial court ball at Hofburg in May 1853, and she was informed that she was to marry him. Neither she or Leopold made a good impression on each other. She protested against the marriage plans without success, but was convinced to submit to it by her mother. Leopold himself also commented that he had agreed to the marriage because of his father.
Marie Henriette resigned from her rights to the Austrian throne and signed the marriage contract in Vienna on August 8, 1853. A wedding by proxy was celebrated at the Schönbrunn Palace on August 10, after which she travelled to Brussels, where the final ceremony was celebrated with Leopold in person on August 22nd.
The wedding was followed by a tour through the Belgian provinces and a trip to Great Britain in October. Queen Victoria commented to king Leopold I about the differences between the couple.
Marie Henriette was described as intelligent, well educated and cultivated, Leopold as well spoken and interested in military issues, but with no common interests between them whatsoever.
They did manage to have four children:
Issue
Louise, Princess Philipp of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha
Prince Leopold, Duke of Brabant
Stéphanie, Crown Princess of Austria
Clémentine, Princess Napoléon
16 Wednesday Mar 2022
Tags
1st Duke of Marlborough, Lady Sarah Churchill, Queen Anne of Great Britain and Ireland, Tories, War of the Spanish Succession, Whigs
Anne’s reign was marked by the further development of a two-party system. In general, the Tories were supportive of the Anglican church and favoured the landed interest of the country gentry, while the Whigs were aligned with commercial interests and Protestant Dissenters.
As a committed Anglican, Anne was inclined to favour the Tories. Her first ministry was predominantly Tory, and contained such High Tories as Daniel Finch, 2nd Earl of Nottingham, and her uncle Laurence Hyde, 1st Earl of Rochester. It was headed by Lord Treasurer Lord Godolphin and Anne’s favourite the Duke of Marlborough, who were considered moderate Tories, along with the Speaker of the House of Commons, Robert Harley.
The Whigs vigorously supported the War of the Spanish Succession and became even more influential after the Duke of Marlborough won a great victory at the Battle of Blenheim in 1704. Many of the High Tories, who opposed British involvement in the land war against France, were removed from office. Godolphin, Marlborough, and Harley, who had replaced Nottingham as Secretary of State for the Northern Department, formed a ruling “triumvirate”.
Sarah, the Duchess of Marlborough, incessantly badgered the Queen to appoint more Whigs and reduce the power of the Tories, whom she considered little better than Jacobites, and the Queen became increasingly discontented with her.
In 1706, Godolphin and the Marlboroughs forced Anne to accept Lord Sunderland, a Junto Whig and the Marlboroughs’ son-in-law, as Harley’s colleague as Secretary of State for the Southern Department.
Although this strengthened the ministry’s position in Parliament, it weakened the ministry’s position with the Queen, as Anne became increasingly irritated with Godolphin and with her former favourite, the Duchess of Marlborough, for supporting Sunderland and other Whig candidates for vacant government and church positions.
The Queen turned for private advice to
Harley, who was uncomfortable with Marlborough and Godolphin’s turn towards the Whigs. She also turned to Abigail Hill, a woman of the bedchamber whose influence grew as Anne’s relationship with Sarah deteriorated. Abigail was related to both Harley and the Duchess, but was politically closer to Harley, and acted as an intermediary between him and the Queen.
The division within the ministry came to a head on 8 February 8, 1708, when Godolphin and the Marlboroughs insisted that the Queen had to either dismiss Harley or do without their services. When the Queen seemed to hesitate, Marlborough and Godolphin refused to attend a cabinet meeting.
Harley attempted to lead business without his former colleagues, and several of those present including Charles Seymour, Duke of Somerset refused to participate until they returned. Her hand forced, the Queen dismissed Harley.
The following month, Anne’s Catholic half-brother, James Francis Edward Stuart, attempted to land in Scotland with French assistance in an attempt to establish himself as king. Anne withheld royal assent from the Scottish Militia Bill 1708 in case the militia raised in Scotland was disloyal and sided with the Jacobites.
She was the last British sovereign to veto a parliamentary bill, although her action was barely commented upon at the time. The invasion fleet never landed and was chased away by British ships commanded by Sir George Byng. As a result of the Jacobite invasion scare, support for the Tories fell and the Whigs were able to secure a majority in the 1708 British general election.
14 Monday Mar 2022
Posted in From the Emperor's Desk, Uncategorized
From the Emperor’s Desk: Today is the 10th anniversary of starting my European Royal History Blog!
In 10 years I’ve written 1,599 articles for my blog and have had 735,552 hits on my blog!
https://europeanroyalhistory.wordpress.com/
So thank you to all my loyal readers and i will continue to deliver quality content!
Liam Foley 👑
18 Tuesday Jan 2022
Posted in Uncategorized
Tags
Emperor of Germany, Emperor of the Germans, Franco-Prussian War, Frankfurt Parliament, Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia, German Emperor, Hall of Mirrors, Otto von Bismarck, Palace of Versailles, Wilhelm I of Germany, Wilhelm I of Prussia
After the Holy Roman Empire was abolished on August 6, 1806, the first attempt at creating a unified German Empire came in the wake of the Revolutions of 1848. In 1849 the liberal Frankfurt Parliament offered the title and position of “Emperor of the Germans” (German: Kaiser der Deutschen) to King Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia.
However, the King declined to accept the title and the office of Emperor with the belief it was “not the Parliament’s to give.” Friedrich Wilhelm IV believed that only the German Princes had the right to make such an offer, in accordance with the traditions of the Holy Roman Empire.
This new German Empire forged by Otto von Bismarck, Minister President of Prussia and Chancellor of the North German Confederation, would be a federal monarchy; the emperor would be the head of state and president of the federated monarchs (the kings of Bavaria, Württemberg, Saxony, the grand dukes of Baden, Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Hesse, among others, as well as the principalities, duchies and of the free cities of Hamburg, Lübeck and Bremen).
King Wilhelm I of Prussia, who was to be the Emperor of this new state, also had difficulty accepting the Imperial title. One of the issues at hand was what would be the official title of this new Emperor?
The title “Emperor of the Germans,” which we have seen had been proposed by the Frankfurt Parliament in 1849, was ruled out by Wilhelm for the similar reasons his brother Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia refused the title.
Wilhelm considered himself a king who ruled by divine right and was chosen “By the Grace of God,” and not by the people in a popular monarchy. But more in general, Wilhelm was unhappy about a title that looked artificial (like he viewed Napoléon’s title), having been created by a constitution. He was also afraid that the position of Emperor would overshadow the Prussian crown.
Despite Wilhelm’s hesitation at becoming Emperor he did prefer the title “Emperor of Germany” (German: Kaiser von Deutschland). However, that title would have signaled a territorial sovereignty over the other German kings and princes which was unacceptable to the South German monarchs, such as Ludwig II of Bavaria. Many south German sovereigns did not desire to be dominated by the Prussian Hohenzollerns.
A compromise was needed. The title German Emperor was carefully chosen by Otto von Bismarck, after intense discussion which continued up until the proclamation of King Wilhelm I of Prussia as Emperor at the Palace of Versailles during the Siege of Paris.
Since the title “Emperor of Germany” suggested sovereignty over the other German states, the title German Emperor was a title that meant to signified the Emperor was a first among equal and fellow sovereigns.
Proclamation of the German Empire in the Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles
Wilhelm accepted this title begrudgingly and on January 18, 1871 Wilhelm I was proclaimed German Emperor in the Hall of Mirrors of the Palace of Versailles (France) towards the end of the Franco-Prussian War. The title German Emperor became the official title of the head of state and hereditary ruler of the German Empire.
The title had been initially introduced earlier within the January 1st 1871 constitution and lasted until the official abdication of Wilhelm II on November 28, 1918.
Under the imperial constitution, the empire was a federation of states under the permanent presidency of the king of Prussia. Thus, the imperial crown was directly tied to the Prussian crown.
12 Wednesday Jan 2022
Tags
Charles V Holy Roman Emperor, Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, Holy Roman Empire, King Louis XI of France, Mary of Burgundy, Pope Julius II
Maximilian I (March 22, 1459 – January 12, 1519).
Maximilian was the son of Friedrich III, Holy Roman Emperor, and Eleanor of Portugal, a Portuguese infanta (princess), daughter of King Duarte of Portugal and his wife Eleanor of Aragon.
He ruled jointly with his father for the last ten years of the latter’s reign, from c. 1483 until his father’s death in 1493.
Maximilian was elected King of the Romans on 16 February 16, 1486 in Frankfurt-am-Main at his father’s initiative and crowned on April 9, 1486 in Aachen. Much of th Austrian territories and Vienna were under the rule of king Matthias Corvinus of Hungary, as a result of the Austrian–Hungarian War (1477–1488). Maximilian was now a king without lands. After the death of king Matthias, from July 1490, Maximilian began a series of short sieges that reconquered cities and fortresses that his father had lost in Austria.
Maximilian was never crowned by the pope, as the journey to Rome was blocked by the Venetians.
In 1508, Maximilian, with the assent of Pope Julius II, took the title Erwählter Römischer Kaiser (“Elected Roman Emperor”), thus ending the centuries-old custom that the Holy Roman Emperor had to be crowned by the Pope.
Maximilian expanded the influence of the House of Habsburg through war and his marriage. In 1477 Maximilian married Mary of Burgundy, the only child of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, and his wife Isabella of Bourbon, she inherited the Burgundian lands at the age of 19 upon the death of her father in the Battle of Nancy on 5 January 1477. She spent most of her reign defending her birthright; in order to counter the appetite of the French king Louis XI for her lands.
Maximilian and Mary’s wedding contract stipulated that their children would succeed them but that the couple could not be each other’s heirs. Mary tried to bypass this rule with a promise to transfer territories as a gift in case of her death, but her plans were confounded. After Mary’s death in a riding accident on March 27, 1482 near the Wijnendale Castle, Maximilian’s aim was now to secure the inheritance to his and Mary’s son, Philipp the Handsome.
Maximilian lost his family’s original lands in today’s Switzerland to the Swiss Confederacy. Through marriage of his son Philipp the Handsome to eventual Queen Joanna of Castile in 1498, Maximilian helped to establish the Habsburg dynasty in Spain, which allowed his grandson Charles to hold the thrones of both Castile and Aragon, and he was the eventual successor to the Imperial Throne of the Holy Roman Empire.
The historian Thomas A. Brady Jr. describes him as “the first Holy Roman Emperor in 250 years who ruled as well as reigned” and also, the “ablest royal warlord of his generation.”
After 1517 Maximilian began to focus entirely on the question of his succession. His goal was to secure the throne for a member of his house and prevent François I of France from gaining the imperial throne.
In 1501, Maximilian fell from his horse and badly injured his leg, causing him pain for the rest of his life. Some historians have suggested that Maximilian was “morbidly” depressed: from 1514, he travelled everywhere with his coffin.
Maximilian died in Wels, Upper Austria, on January 12, 1519 at the age of 59. The death of Maximilian seemed to put the succession at risk. However, The Fugger family provided Maximilian a credit of one million gulden, which was used to bribe the prince-electors. However, the bribery claims have been challenged. At first, this policy seemed successful, and Maximilian managed to secure the votes from Mainz, Cologne, Brandenburg and Bohemia for his grandson Charles.
Maximilian’s son, Philipp the Handsome (King Felipe I of Castile by right of his wife) had died in 1506. The resulting “election campaign” was unprecedented due to the massive use of bribery. Within a few months the election of his grandson as Holy Roman Emperor Charles V was secured. Charles had also succeeded his maternal grandfather, King Fernando II-V of Aragon and Castile in 1516 and became King Carlos I of a united Spain. With his election as Emperor, Charles V ruled an empire as vast and as powerful as that of Charlemagne ‘s centuries earlier.
13 Monday Dec 2021
Tags
Antoine de Bourbon, Catholic League, Excommunication, French Wars of Religion, Henry III of France, Henry IV of France and Navarre, Huguenot, King of Navarre, Margaret of Valois, Pope Sixtus V
Henri IV (December 13, 1553 – May 14, 1610), also known by the epithet Good King Henri or Henri the Great, was King of Navarre (as Henri III) from 1572 and King of France from 1589 to 1610. He was the first monarch of France from the House of Bourbon, a cadet branch of the Capetian dynasty.
The son of Antoine de Bourbon, Duke of Vendôme and Jeanne III d’Albret, the Queen of Navarre, Henri was baptised as a Catholic but raised in the Protestant faith by his mother.
As a teenager, Henri joined the Huguenot forces in the French Wars of Religion. On June 9, 1572, upon his mother’s death, the 19-year-old became King of Navarre.
At Queen Jeanne III’s death, it was arranged for Henri to marry Margaret of Valois, daughter of Henri II of France and Catherine de’ Medici. The wedding took place in Paris on August 18, 1572 on the parvis of Notre Dame Cathedral.
On August 24, the St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre began in Paris. Several thousand Protestants who had come to Paris for Henri’s wedding were killed, as well as thousands more throughout the country in the days that followed.
Henri narrowly escaped death thanks to the help of his wife and his promise to convert to Catholicism. He was forced to live at the court of France, but he escaped in early 1576. On February 5 of that year, he formally abjured Catholicism at Tours and rejoined the Protestant forces in the military conflict. He named his 16-year-old sister, Catherine de Bourbon, regent of Béarn. Catherine held the regency for nearly thirty years.
Henri and his predecessor Henri III of France were direct descendants of Saint-King Louis IX. Henri III belonged to the House of Valois, descended from Philippe III of France, elder son of Saint Louis; Henri IV belonged to the House of Bourbon, descended from Robert, Count of Clermont, younger son of Saint Louis IX. As Head of the House of Bourbon, Henri was “first prince of the blood”.
When Henri III died, Henri of Navarre nominally became king of France. The Catholic League, however, strengthened by support from outside the country—especially from Spain—was strong enough to prevent a universal recognition of his new title.
Pope Sixtus V excommunicated Henri and declared him devoid of any right to inherit the crown. Most of the Catholic nobles who had joined Henri III for the siege of Paris also refused to recognize the claim of Henri of Navarre, and abandoned him. He set about winning his kingdom by military conquest, aided by English money and German troops. Henri’s Catholic uncle Charles, Cardinal de Bourbon was proclaimed king by the Catholic League, but the Cardinal was Henri’s prisoner at the time. Henri was victorious at the Battle of Arques and the Battle of Ivry, but failed to take Paris after besieging it in 1590.
When Cardinal de Bourbon died in 1590, the League could not agree on a new candidate. While some supported various Guise candidates, the strongest candidate was probably the Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain, the daughter of Felipe II of Spain, whose mother Elisabeth had been the eldest daughter of Henri II of France.
In the religious fervor of the time, the Infanta was recognized to be a suitable candidate, provided that she marry a suitable husband. The French overwhelmingly rejected Felipe’s first choice, Archduke Ernst of Austria, the Emperor’s brother, also a member of the House of Habsburg.
In case of such opposition, Felipe indicated that Princes of the House of Lorraine would be acceptable to him: the Duke of Guise; a son of the Duke of Lorraine; and the son of the Duke of Mayenne. The Spanish ambassadors selected the Duke of Guise, to the joy of the League. However, at that moment of seeming victory, the envy of the Duke of Mayenne was aroused, and he blocked the proposed election of a king.
The Parlement of Paris also upheld the Salic law. They argued that if the French accepted natural hereditary succession, as proposed by the Spaniards, and accepted a woman as their queen, then the ancient claims of the English kings would be confirmed, and the monarchy of centuries past would be nothing but an illegality.
The Parlement admonished Mayenne, as lieutenant-general, that the Kings of France had resisted the interference of the pope in political matters, and that he should not raise a foreign prince or princess to the throne of France under the pretext of religion. Mayenne was angered that he had not been consulted prior to this admonishment, but yielded, since their aim was not contrary to his present views.
Despite these setbacks for the League, Henri of Navarre remained unable to take control of Paris.
On July 25, 1593, with the encouragement of his mistress, Gabrielle d’Estrées, Henri permanently renounced Protestantism and converted to Catholicism in order to secure his hold on the French crown, thereby earning the resentment of the Huguenots and his former ally Queen Elizabeth I of England.
He was said to have declared that Paris vaut bien une messe (“Paris is well worth a mass”), although there is some doubt whether he said this, or whether the statement was attributed to him by his contemporaries. His acceptance of Catholicism secured the allegiance of the vast majority of his subjects.
Coronation and recognition (1594–95)
Since Reims, traditional coronation place of French kings, was still occupied by the Catholic League, Henri was crowned King of France at the Cathedral of Chartres on February 25, 1594. Pope Clement VIII lifted the excommunication from Henri on September 17, 1595. He did not forget his former Calvinist coreligionists, however, and was known for his religious tolerance. In 1598 he issued the Edict of Nantes, which granted circumscribed toleration to the Huguenots, thereby effectively ending the French Wars of Religion.
Henri was the target of at least 12 assassination attempts, being considered a usurper by some Catholics and a traitor by some Protestants. Though he faced much opposition during his reign, Henri IV gained more status after his death. An active ruler, he worked to regularise state finance, promote agriculture, eliminate corruption and encourage education. During his reign, the French colonization of the Americas truly began with the foundation of the colonies of Acadia and Canada at Port-Royal and Quebec, respectively. He is celebrated in the popular song “Vive le roi Henri” (which later became an anthem for the French monarchy during the reigns of his successors) and in Voltaire’s Henriade.
On August 18, 1572, Henry married his second cousin Margaret of Valois; their childless marriage was annulled in 1599. His subsequent marriage to Marie de’ Medici on 17 December 1600 produced six children:
HenrI’s first marriage was not a happy one, and the couple remained childless. Henri and Margaret separated even before Henri acceded to the throne in August 1589; Margaret retired to the Château d’Usson in the Auvergne and lived there for many years. After Henri became king of France, it was of the utmost importance that he provide an heir to the crown to avoid the problem of a disputed succession.
Henri favoured the idea of obtaining an annulment of his marriage to Margaret and taking his mistress Gabrielle d’Estrées as his bride; after all, she had already borne him three children. Henri’s councillors strongly opposed this idea, but the matter was resolved unexpectedly by Gabrielle’s sudden death in the early hours of April 10, 1599, after she had given birth to a premature and stillborn son. His marriage to Margaret was annulled in 1599, and Henri married Marie de’ Medici, daughter of Francesco I de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, and Archduchess Joanna of Austria, in 1600.
Assassination
Henri was the subject of numerous attempts on his life, including one by Pierre Barrière in August 1593 and Jean Châtel in December 1594.
Henri IV was killed in Paris on May 14, 1610 by a Catholic fanatic, François Ravaillac, who stabbed him in the Rue de la Ferronnerie. Henri IV’s coach was stopped by traffic congestion associated with the Queen’s coronation ceremony. Hercule de Rohan, duc de Montbazon, was with him when he was killed; Montbazon was wounded, but survived. Henri IV was buried at the Saint Denis Basilica.
His widow, Marie de’ Medici, served as regent for their nine-year-old son, Louis XIII, until 1617.
21 Thursday Oct 2021
Tags
Archduke Charles of Austria-Este, Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, Archduke Otto of Austria, Emperor Franz Joseph of Austria-Hungary, House of Habsburg-Lorraine, King of Croatia and Bohemia, King of Hungary, Wedding, World War I, Zita of Bourbon-Parma
Archduke Charles of Austria-Este, the son of Archduke Otto of Austria and Princess Maria Josepha of Saxony, fifth child of King Georg of Saxony and Infanta Maria Anna of Portugal, herself the eldest surviving daughter of Queen Maria II of Portugal and her King Consort, Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg-Koháry.
Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg-Koháry was the son Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Princess Maria Antonia Koháry de Csábrág who founded the Catholic cadet branch of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, after their marriage.
Charles became heir presumptive of Emperor Franz Joseph of Austria-Hungary after his uncle Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria was assassinated in 1914. Franz Ferdinand’ assassination was the spark that set off World War I.
Princess Zita of Bourbon-Parma, born as the seventeenth child of the dispossessed Roberto I, Duke of Parma, and his second wife, Infanta Maria Antonia of Portugal, herself the seventh and last child of King Miguel of Portugal and Adelaide of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Rosenberg. The unusual name Zita was given to her after Zita, a popular Italian Saint who had lived in Tuscany in the 13th century.
In the close vicinity of Schwarzau castle was the Villa Wartholz, residence of Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria, Zita’s maternal aunt. Archduchess Maria Theresa was born as Infanta Maria Theresa of Portugal and the second daughter of Miguel I of Portugal and Princess Adelaide of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Rosenberg. She was the stepmother of Archduke Otto, who died in 1906, and the step-grandmother of Archduke Charles of Austria-Este, at that time second-in-line to the Austrian throne. Archduchess Maria Theresa’s sister was Princess Zita’s mother, Infanta Maria Antonia of Portugal.
Archduchess Maria Annunziata and Archduchess Elisabeth Amalie of Austria, were the two daughters of Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria were Zita’s first cousins and Charles’ half-aunts. Charles and Zita had met as children but did not see one another for almost ten years, as each pursued their education. In 1909, his Dragoon regiment was stationed at Brandýs nad Labem, from where he visited his aunt at Františkovy Lázně.
It was during one of these visits that Charles and Zita became reacquainted.,Charles was under pressure to marry (Franz Ferdinand, his uncle and first-in-line, had married morganatically, and his children were excluded from the throne) and Zita had a suitably royal genealogy.
Zita later recalled:
We were of course glad to meet again and became close friends. On my side feelings developed gradually over the next two years. He seemed to have made his mind up much more quickly, however, and became even more keen when, in the autumn of 1910, rumours spread about that I had got engaged to a distant Spanish relative, Don Jaime, the Duke of Madrid. On hearing this, the Archduke came down post haste from his regiment at Brandýs and sought out his grandmother, Archduchess Maria Theresa, who was also my aunt and the natural confidante in such matters. He asked if the rumor was true and when told it was not, he replied, “Well, I had better hurry in any case or she will get engaged to someone else.”
Archduke Charles traveled to Villa Pianore and asked for Zita’s hand and, on June 13, 1911, their engagement was announced at the Austrian court.: Zita in later years recalled that after her engagement she had expressed to Charles her worries about the fate of the Austrian Empire and the challenges of the monarchy.
Charles and Zita were married at the Schwarzau castle on October 21, 1911. Charles’s great-uncle, the 81-year-old Emperor Franz Joseph, attended the wedding. He was relieved to see an heir make a suitable marriage, and was in good spirits, even leading the toast at the wedding breakfast. Archduchess Zita soon conceived a son, and Archduke Otto, future Crown Prince of Austria, was born November 20, 1912. Seven more children followed in the next decade.
In 1916, Emperor Franz Joseph died and Charles became Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary (as Charles IV), King of Croatia, and King of Bohemia (as Charles III), and the last of the monarchs belonging to the House of Habsburg-Lorraine to rule over Austria-Hungary.
At the end of the Great War, on the day of the Armistice of November 11, 1918, Charles issued a carefully worded proclamation in which he recognized the Austrian people’s right to determine the form of the state and “relinquish[ed] every participation in the administration of the State.” He also released his officials from their oath of loyalty to him. On the same day, the Imperial Family left Schönbrunn Palace and moved to Castle Eckartsau, east of Vienna. On November 13, following a visit with Hungarian magnates, Charles issued a similar proclamation—the Eckartsau Proclamation—for Hungary.
Although it has widely been cited as an “abdication”, the word itself was never used in either proclamation. Indeed, he deliberately avoided using the word abdication in the hope that the people of either Austria or Hungary would vote to recall him.
Encouraged by Hungarian royalists (“legitimists”), Charles sought twice in 1921 to reclaim the throne of Hungary, but failed largely because Hungary’s regent, Admiral Miklós Horthy (the last commander of the Imperial and Royal Navy), refused to support Charles’s restoration.
After the second failed attempt at restoration in Hungary, Charles and his pregnant wife Zita were arrested and quarantined at Tihany Abbey. On 1 November 1921 they were taken to the Hungarian Danube harbour city of Baja, were taken on board the monitor HMS Glowworm, and there removed to the Black Sea where they were transferred to the light cruiser HMS Cardiff. On November 19, 1921 they arrived at their final exile, the Portuguese island of Madeira. Compared to the imperial glory in Vienna and even at Eckartsau, conditions there were certainly impoverished.
Charles did not leave Madeira. On March 9, 1922 he had caught a cold in town, which developed into bronchitis and subsequently progressed to severe pneumonia. Having suffered two heart attacks, he died of respiratory failure on April 1, in the presence of his wife (who was pregnant with their eighth child) and nine-year-old former Crown Prince Otto, remaining conscious almost until his last moments. His last words to his wife were “I love you so much.” He was 34 years old. .
After her husband’s death, Zita and her son Otto served as symbols of unity for the exiled dynasty. A devout Catholic, she raised a large family after being widowed at the age of 29, and never remarried.
Zita lived a long life. After a memorable 90th birthday, at which she was surrounded by her now vast family, Zita’s habitually robust health began to fail. She developed inoperable cataracts in both eyes. Her last big family gathering took place at Zizers, in 1987, when her children and grandchildren joined in celebrating Empress Zita’s 95th birthday.
While visiting her daughter, in summer 1988, she developed pneumonia and spent most of the autumn and winter bedridden. Finally, she called Archduke Otto, in early March 1989, and told him she was dying. He and the rest of the family travelled to her bedside and took turns keeping her company until she died in the early hours of March 14, 1989. She was 96 years old, and was the last surviving child of Roberto, Duke of Parma from both his marriages.
Her funeral was held in Vienna on April 1. The government allowed it to take place on Austrian soil providing that the cost was borne by the Habsburgs themselves. Zita’s body was carried to the Imperial Crypt under Capuchin Church in the same funeral coach she had walked behind during the funeral of Emperor Franz Joseph in 1916.
Her funeral was attended by over 200 members of the Habsburg and Bourbon-Parma families, and the service had 6,000 attendees including leading politicians, state officials and international representatives, including a representative of Pope John Paul II.
Following an ancient custom, the Empress had asked that her heart, which was placed in an urn, stay behind at Muri Abbey, in Switzerland, where the Emperor’s heart had rested for decades. In doing so, Zita assured herself that, in death, she and her husband would remain by each other’s side.
15 Friday Oct 2021
Tags
Edgar the Ætheling, King of the English, King of the Franks, Malcolm III of Scotland, Norman Conquest, Philip I of France, Robert Curthose, William II of England, William II of Normandy, William Rufus, William the Conqueror
1066 – Following the death of Harold II at the Battle of Hastings, Edgar the Ætheling is proclaimed King of England by the Witan; he is never crowned, and concedes power to William the Conqueror two months later.
Edgar Ætheling or Edgar II (c. 1052 – 1125 or after) was the last male member of the royal house of Cerdic of Wessex (see House of Wessex family tree). He was elected King of England by the Witenagemot in 1066, but never crowned.
Edgar was born in the Kingdom of Hungary, where his father Edward the Exile, son of King Edmund Ironside, had spent most of his life, having been sent into exile after Edmund’s death and the conquest of England by the Danish king Cnut the Great in 1016.
Edgar II the Ætheling, King of the English
His grandfather Edmund, great-grandfather Æthelred II the Unready, and great-great-grandfather Edgar the Peaceful were all kings of England before Cnut the Great took the crown. Edgar’s mother was Agatha, who was described as a relative of the Holy Roman Emperor or a descendant of Saint Stephen of Hungary, but whose exact identity is unknown.
Edgar was his parents’ only son but had two sisters, Margaret and Cristina. In 1057 Edward the Exile arrived in England with his family, but died almost immediately. Edgar, a child, was left as the only surviving male member of the Royal House of Wessex apart from the king. However, the latter made no recorded effort to entrench his great-nephew’s position as heir to a throne that was being eyed by a range of powerful potential contenders, including England’s leading aristocrat Harold Godwinson, Earl of Wessex, and the foreign rulers Duke William II of Normandy, Sweyn II of Denmark and Harald III of Norway.
Succession struggle
When King Edward the Confessor died in January 1066, Edgar was still in his early teens, considered too young to be an effective military leader. This had not been an insurmountable obstacle in the succession of previous kings. However, the avaricious ambitions that had been aroused across north-western Europe by the Confessor’s lack of an heir prior to 1057, and by the king’s failure thereafter to prepare the way for Edgar to succeed him, removed any prospect of a peaceful hereditary succession.
War was clearly inevitable and Edgar was in no position to fight it, while he was without powerful adult relatives to champion his cause. Accordingly, the Witenagemot elected Harold Godwinson, the man best placed to defend the country against the competing foreign claimants, to succeed Edward.
Following King Harold II’s death at the Battle of Hastings against the invading Normans in October, some of the Anglo-Saxon leaders considered electing Edgar king. The new regime thus established was dominated by the most powerful surviving members of the English ruling class: Stigand, Archbishop of Canterbury, Ealdred, Archbishop of York, and the brothers Edwin, Earl of Mercia and Morcar, Earl of Northumbria.
The commitment of these men to Edgar’s cause, men who had so recently passed over his claim to the throne without apparent demur, must have been doubtful from the start. The strength of their resolve to continue the struggle against William of Normandy was questionable, and the military response they organised to the continuing Norman advance was ineffectual.
When William crossed the Thames at Wallingford, he was met by Stigand, who now abandoned Edgar and submitted to the invader. As the Normans closed in on London, Edgar’s key supporters in the city began negotiating with William. In early December, the remaining members of the Witan in London met and resolved to take the young uncrowned king out to meet William to submit to him at Berkhamsted, quietly setting aside Edgar’s election. Edgar, alongside other lords, did homage to King William at his coronation in December.
There are some historians that regard Edgar the Ætheling as a legitimate King of the English as Edgar II whose reign lasted for two short months making his reign the shortest reign in British history. Generally the reign of William the Conqueror is marked as starting on Christmas Day 1066 and not on October 14, the day of the Battle of Hastings and the death of King Harold II Godwinson.
William kept Edgar in his custody and took him, along with other English leaders, to his court in Normandy in 1067, before returning with them to England. Edgar may have been involved in the abortive rebellion of the Earls Edwin and Morcar in 1068, or he may have been attempting to return to Hungary with his family and been blown off course; in any case, in that year he arrived with his mother and sisters at the court of King Malcolm III of Scotland. Malcolm married Edgar’s sister Margaret, and agreed to support Edgar in his attempt to reclaim the English throne. When the rebellion that resulted in the Harrying of the North broke out in Northumbria at the beginning of 1069, Edgar returned to England with other rebels who had fled to Scotland, to become the leader, or at least the figurehead, of the revolt.
Late in the year of 1069, William fought his way into Northumbria and occupied York, buying off the Danes and devastating the surrounding country. Early in 1070, he moved against Edgar and other English leaders who had taken refuge with their remaining followers in a marshy region, perhaps Holderness or the Isle of Ely, and put them to flight. Edgar then returned to Scotland.
Edgar remained there until 1072, when William invaded Scotland and forced King Malcolm to submit to his overlordship. The terms of the agreement between them included the expulsion of Edgar. He therefore took up residence in Flanders, whose count, Robert the Frisian, was hostile to the Normans. However, he was able to return to Scotland in 1074.
Shortly after his arrival there, he received an offer from Philippe I, King of the Franks (France), who was also at odds with William, of a castle and lands near the borders of Normandy from where he would be able to raid his enemies’ homeland. He embarked with his followers for France, but a storm wrecked their ships on the English coast. Many of Edgar’s men were hunted down by the Normans, but he managed to escape with the remainder to Scotland by land. Following this disaster, he was persuaded by Malcolm to make peace with William and return to England as his subject, abandoning any ambition of regaining his ancestral throne.
After King William’s death in 1087, Edgar supported William’s eldest son Robert Curthose for the Englishthrone, who succeeded him as Duke of Normandy, against his second son, William Rufus, who received the throne of England as William II. Edgar was one of Robert’s three principal advisors at this time. The war waged by Robert and his allies to overthrow William ended in defeat in 1091. As part of the resulting settlement between the brothers, Edgar was deprived of lands which he had been granted by Robert.
Back in Europe, Edgar again took the side of Robert Curthose in the internal struggles of the Norman dynasty, this time against Robert’s youngest brother, who was now Henry I, King of England. He was taken prisoner in the final defeat at the Battle of Tinchebray in 1106, which resulted in Robert being imprisoned for the rest of his life. Edgar was more fortunate: having been taken back to England, he was pardoned and released by King Henry.
Edgar’s niece Edith (renamed Matilda), daughter of Malcolm III and Margaret, had married Henry in 1100. Edgar is believed to have travelled to Scotland once more late in life, perhaps around the year 1120. He lived to see the death at sea in November 1120 of William Adeling (Ætheling), the son of his niece Edith and heir to Henry I. Edgar was still alive in 1125, according to William of Malmesbury, who wrote at the time that Edgar “now grows old in the country in privacy and quiet”. Edgar died some time after this contemporary reference, but the exact date and the location of his grave are not known.
According to a 1291 Huntingdon Priory Chronicle, Edgar had one child, Margaret Lovel, who was the wife of firstly Ralph Lovel II, of Castle Cary and secondly of Robert de Londres, both of whom had estates in southern Scotland.
There are two references to an “Edgar Adeling” found in the Magnus Rotulus Pipae Northumberland (Pipe rolls) for the years 1158 and 1167. Historian Edward Freeman, writing in The History of the Norman Conquest of England, says that this was the same Edgar (aged over 100), a son of his, or some other person known by the title Ætheling.
12 Tuesday Oct 2021
Tags
annexation, German Mediatization, Holy Roman Empire, King Frederick the Great of Prussia, Lolotte Forssberg, Princess-Abbess of Quedlinburg, Sophia Albertina of Sweden, Treaty of Lunéville
The intimate friend of Sophia Albertina, Caroline Rudenschöld, refers to these issues of the father of her daughter in a letter from 1792, where she mentions two love interests of Sophia Albertina. Rudenschöld mentioned that she was concerned about a confidence the Princess had given her, but that she was assured that Sophia Albertina would “do everything that is in your power to do, to overcome this unfortunate passion” and to “use your sense to overpower it”, and she ads: “I can understand that this inclination of yours is so much more unfortunate than the last one”. Ulla Möllersvärd has been rumored to be her daughter.
Lolotte Forssberg affair
In 1795, the Lolotte Forssberg affair occurred, which caused considerable attention. Lolotte Forssberg was the chamber maid and foster sibling of Sophia Albertina. In 1795, an anonymous letter was found by Sophia Albertina, which pointed out Lolotte Forssberg as her secret sister. Sophia Albertina issued an investigation, and believed herself to have reasons to believe that Forssberg was indeed her sister, and therefore decided to take responsibility for her welfare and treat her officially as a sister.
Sophia Albertina believed for a time that Forssberg was her legitimate sister, whose births her parents had reasons to hide, and therefore demanded that Lolotte Forssberg should be officially recognised. This caused a scandal, not only in Sweden, but also in the Holy Roman Empire, where her maternal relatives, the Prussian royal family, expressed their disapproval of what they perceived as a deception of which she had been a victim.
It is likely, that Lolotte Forssberg was in fact her sister, but her illegitimate half sister by her father and a lady-in waiting, Ulla von Liewen. In 1799, Sophia Albertina herself stated that Lolotte Forssberg was her illegitimate halfsister, and arranged a marriage with her courtier, Count Magus Stenbock, and had her presented at court. Gossip would later suggest, that Lolotte Forssberg was the illegitimate child of Sophia Albertina herself, but as Forssberg was born in 1766, she was evidently not the same woman as the alleged secret daughter of Sophia Albertina and Frederick Hessenstein, who had been born in 1785. Lolotte Forssberg was to remain with Sophia Albertina her entire life, and was named as her heir in her will.
Reign as Princess-Abbess
In 1767, by the grace of her maternal uncle Friedrich the Great (Friedrich II of Prussia), Sophia Albertina was made Coadjutrix of Quedlinburg Abbey, a convent of Lutheran women.
In 1787, one or two years after allegedly secretly giving birth, she succeeded her maternal aunt, Anna Amalia of Prussia, as Princess-Abbess of Quedlinburg. As such, she was the reigning head of a German state directly under the Holy Roman Empire, and thus a monarch in the Empire.
When she succeeded as abbess, Friedrich II of Prussia offered to “relieve” her from the position by buying the realm of Quedlinburg and annexing it to Prussia. She declined the offer by saying that she was sure that he was not serious. Sophia Albertina travelled to Quedlinburg in 1787, and took her oath as abbess on October 15.
As Princess-Abbess, she was active in the rule of the city of Quedlinburg, and her rule has been described as a popular one. She founded schools for poor children, established the first theatre in the city, and increased the salary of the clergy. Gossip pointed out Quedlinburg as a place where noblewomen went to give birth to their illegitimate children in secret. She brought with her a court of 50 people, and often entertained guests, particularly her German relatives, during her stays at Quedlinburg. Sophia Albertina was present in Quedlinburg from 1787 to 1788, a second period from 1792 until 1795, and a third period from 1799 until 1803. She managed the affairs of the state in cooperation with her chancellor Sebastian von Moltzer.
In the German Mediatization, the state of Quedlinburg was dissolved and incorporated into Prussia. This was done after the Treaty of Lunéville, when the French First Republic allowed the German secular monarchs to annex the German church states. Sophia Albertina was simply told on July 11, 1802 that the state was now a part of Prussia and that she was thereby deprived of all political authority. She was however allowed to keep the title and income for life. She remained with her court until September 1803.
European Royal History 