Happy Birthday HRH Prince George of Cambridge.

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Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, Duke of Cambridge, Prince Charles, Prince George of Cambridge, Prince William, Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, Queen Victoria, the prince of Wales

Prince George of Cambridge (George Alexander Louis; born July 22, 2013) is a member of the British royal family. He is the eldest child of Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, and third in the line of succession to the British throne behind his grandfather Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales and his father. As he is expected to become king one day, his birth was widely celebrated across the Commonwealth realms. George occasionally accompanies his parents on royal tours and engagements.

George was born in the Lindo Wing of St Mary’s Hospital, London, at 16:24 BST (15:24 UTC) on July 22, 2013. The birth was uncustomarily announced by press conference instead of through an easel outside Buckingham Palace, though an easel was placed following the birth. The newborn was widely hailed as a future king in the majority of British newspapers. 21-gun salutes signalled the birth in the capitals of Bermuda and New Zealand; the bells of Westminster Abbey and many other churches were rung; and landmarks in the Commonwealth realms were illuminated in various colours, mostly blue to signify the birth of a boy. On 24 July, his name was announced as George Alexander Louis.

George’s father, the Duke of Cambridge, is the elder son of the Prince of Wales, who is the eldest son of Queen Elizabeth II, placing George third in the line of succession to the British throne. Speculation ensued during the pregnancy of the Duchess of Cambridge that the birth would boost the British national economy and provide a focus for national pride.

George was christened by Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, in the Chapel Royal at St James’s Palace on October 23, 2013, with Oliver Baker, Emilia Jardine-Paterson, Earl Grosvenor, Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton, Julia Samuel, William van Cutsem and Zara Tindall serving as godparents. The font used at the ceremony was made for Queen Victoria’s first child and the water was taken from the River Jordan. Commemorative coins were issued by the Royal Mint and the Royal Canadian Mint; the first time a royal birth had been marked that way. Prince George’s birth marked the second time that three generations in direct line of succession to the throne have been alive at the same time, a situation that last occurred between 1894 and 1901, in the last seven years of the reign of Queen Victoria.

July 7, 1528: Birth of Archduchess Anna of Austria, Duchess consort of Bavaria.

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Albert V of Bavaria, Archduchess Anna of Austria, Archduke of Austria, Archduke of Austria and Johanna, Barbara, Catherine, Charles II, Duchess consort of Bavaria, Duchess of Ferrara, Duchess of Mantua, Duchess of Tuscany, Eleanor, Elizabeth, Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor, House of Habsburg, House of Wittelsbach, Maximilian II, Queen of Poland

Archduchess Anna of Austria (July 7, 1528 – October 16, 1590), was a member of the Imperial House of Habsburg, and she was Duchess of Bavaria from 1550 until 1579, by her marriage with Duke Albrecht V.

Born at the Bohemian court in Prague, Anna was the third of fifteen children of King Ferdinand I (1503–1564) from his marriage with the Jagiellonian princess Anna of Bohemia and Hungary (1503–1547). Her siblings included: Elizabeth, Queen of Poland, Maximilian II, Holy Roman Emperor, Ferdinand II, Archduke of Austria, Catherine, Queen of Poland, Eleanor, Duchess of Mantua, Barbara, Duchess of Ferrara, Charles II, Archduke of Austria and Johanna, Duchess of Tuscany.

Archduchess Anna of Austria

Anna’s paternal grandparents were King Felipe I of Castile and his wife Queen Joanna I. Her maternal grandparents were King Vladislaus II of Bohemia and Hungary and his third wife Anne de Foix.

Life

Young Anna was engaged several times as a child, first to Prince Theodor of Bavaria (1526–1534), the eldest son of Duke Wilhelm IV, then to Charles d’Orléans (1522–1545). However, both died at a young age.

Anna finally married on July 4, 1546 in Regensburg at the age of 17, Duke Albrecht V of Bavaria the younger brother of her first fiancé. Duke Albrecht V of Bavaria (1528-1579) was Duke of Bavaria from 1550 until his death. He was born in Munich to Duke Wilhelm IV of Bavaria and Princess Maria Jacobäa of Baden.

The wedding gift was 50,000 Guilder. This marriage was part of a web of alliances in which her uncle Emperor Charles V hoped to secure Duke Wilhelm IV’s support before embarking on the Schmalkaldic Wars. Indeed, Duke Wilhelm IV, though he remained formally neutral, granted the passage of Imperial troops to march against the forces of the Schmalkaldic League which besieged the Ingolstadt fortress.

Albrecht V, Duke of Bavaria

After their marriage, the young couple lived at the Trausnitz Castle in Landshut, until Albrecht became duke upon his father’s death on March 7, 1550. At the Munich Residenz, Anna and Albrecht had great influence on the spiritual life in the Duchy of Bavaria, and enhanced the reputation of Munich as a city of art, by founding several museums and laying the foundations for the Bavarian State Library.

Anna and Albrecht were also patrons to the painter Hans Muelich and the Franco-Flemish composer Orlande de Lassus. In 1552, the duke commissioned an inventory of the jewelry in the couple’s possession. The resulting manuscript, still held by the Bavarian State Library, was the Jewel Book of the Duchess Anna of Bavaria (“Kleinodienbuch der Herzogin Anna von Bayern“), and contains 110 drawings by Hans Muelich.

A religious woman, Anna made extensive donations to the Catholic abbey of Vadstena in Sweden and generously supported the Franciscan Order. She also provided a strict education of her grandson, the later Elector Maximilian I of Bavaria.

When her husband died on October 24, 1579 and was succeeded by his eldest surviving son, Wilhelm V, Anna as Dowager Duchess maintained her own court at the Munich Residenz. 150 years after her death in 1590, her descendant Elector Charles I of Bavaria used her marriage treaty with Albrecht as a pretext to claim the Austrian and Bohemian crown lands of the Habsburg Monarchy.