August 17, 1887: Birth of Charles I-IV, Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary. Part I.

Tags

Archduke Franz Ferdinand, Austria-Hungary, Charles I of Austria, Emperor Franz Joseph, King Georg of Saxony, Robert I of Bourbon-Parma, War of the Austrian Succession, World War I, Zita of Bourbon-Parma

Charles I (Charles Franz Joseph Ludwig Hubert Georg Otto Maria; August 17, 1887 – April 1, 1922) was the last Emperor of Austria, the last King of Hungary (as Charles IV), the last King of Bohemia (as Charles III), and the last monarch belonging to the House of Habsburg-Lorraine before the dissolution of Austria-Hungary.

Charles I-IV, Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary

Archduke Charles was born on August 17, 1887, in the Castle of Persenbeug, in Lower Austria. His parents were Archduke Otto-Franz of Austria and Princess Maria-Josepha of Saxony, the daughter of the future King Georg of Saxony (1832–1904) and Infanta Maria Anna of Portugal (1843–1884).

Archduke Otto-Franz of Austria (Father)

Princess Maria-Josepha of Saxony (Mother)

At the time of his birth, his great-uncle Franz-Joseph reigned as Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary. Upon the death of Crown Prince Rudolph in 1889, the Emperor’s brother, Archduke Charles-Ludwig, was next in line to the Austro-Hungarian throne. However, his death in 1896 from typhoid made his eldest son, Archduke Franz-Ferdinand, the new heir presumptive.

Franz-Joseph, Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary

Archduke Charles was reared a devout Catholic. He spent his early years wherever his father’s regiment happened to be stationed; later on, he lived in Vienna and Reichenau an der Rax. He was privately educated, but, contrary to the custom ruling in the imperial family, he attended a public gymnasium for the sake of demonstrations in scientific subjects. On the conclusion of his studies at the gymnasium, he entered the army, spending the years from 1906-08 as an officer chiefly in Prague, where he studied Law and Political Science concurrently with his military duties.

In 1911, Charles married Princess Zita of Bourbon-Parma, the seventeenth child of the dispossessed Robert I, Duke of Parma, and his second wife, Infanta Maria Antonia of Portugal.

Princess Zita of Bourbon-Parma

They 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 in Bohemia, from where he visited his aunt at Franzensbad. It was during one of these visits that Charles and Zita became reacquainted. Due to Franz-Ferdinand’s morganatic marriage in 1900, his children were excluded from the succession. As a result, the Emperor pressured Charles to marry. Zita not only shared Charles’ devout Catholicism, but also an impeccable royal lineage.

Archduke Charles traveled to Villa Pianore, the Italian winter residence of Zita’s parents, and asked for her hand; on June 13, 1911, their engagement was announced at the Austrian court. Charles and Zita were married at the Bourbon-Parma castle of Schwarzau in Austria on October 21, 1911.

The wedding of Zita and Charles, 21 October 1911. (the man in the back with the mustache is Archduke Franz-Ferdinand)

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 Otto was born November 20, 1912. Seven more children followed in the next decade.

Heir presumptive

Charles became heir presumptive after the assassination of Archduke Franz-Ferdinand in Sarajevo in 1914, the event which precipitated World War I. Only at this time did the old Emperor take steps to initiate the heir-presumptive to his crown in affairs of state. But the outbreak of World War I interfered with this political education. Charles spent his time during the first phase of the war at headquarters at Teschen, but exercised no military influence.

Charles then became a Feldmarschall (Field Marshal) in the Austro-Hungarian Army. In the spring of 1916, in connection with the offensive against Italy, he was entrusted with the command of the XX. Corps, whose affections the heir-presumptive to the throne won by his affability and friendliness. The offensive, after a successful start, soon came to a standstill. Shortly afterwards, Charles went to the eastern front as commander of an army operating against the Russians and Romanians.

My Favorite Crowns. #6: The Imperial Crown of Russia. Part I.

Tags

Catherine II of Russia, Catherine the Great, Crown of Monomakh, Crowns of Europe, Emperor Franz Joseph, Regalia, The Imperial Crown of Russia

The Imperial Crown of Russia, also known as the Great Imperial Crown, was used by the monarchs of Russia from 1762 until the Russian monarchy’s abolition in 1917. The Great Imperial Crown was first used in a coronation by Empress Catherine II the Great, and it was last worn at the coronation of Emperor Nicholas II. It was displayed prominently next to Emperor Nicholas II on a cushion at the State Opening of the Russian Duma inside the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg in 1906. It survived the 1917 revolution and is currently on display in Moscow at the Kremlin Armoury’s State Diamond Fund.

The Great Imperial Crown

By 1613, when Michael Romanov, the first Tsar of the Romanov Dynasty, was crowned, the Russian regalia included a pectoral cross, a golden chain, a barmas (wide ceremonial collar), the Crown of Monomakh, sceptre, and orb. Over the centuries, various Tsars had fashioned their own private crowns, modeled for the most part after the Crown of Monomakh, but these were for personal use and not for the coronation.

Crown of Monomakh

In 1719, Tsar Peter I the Great founded the earliest version of what is now known as the Russian Federation’s State Diamond Fund. Peter had visited other European nations, and introduced many innovations to Russia, one of which was the creation of a permanent fund (фонд) to house a collection of jewels that belonged not to the Romanov family, but to the Russian State. Peter placed all of the regalia in this fund and declared that the state holdings were inviolate and could not be altered, sold, or given away—and he also decreed that each subsequent Emperor or Empress should leave a certain number of pieces acquired during their reign to the State, for the permanent glory of the Russian Empire.

Catherine II the Great

From this collection came a new set of regalia, including eventually the Great Imperial Crown, to replace the Crown of Monomakh and other crowns used by earlier Russian Tsars and Grand Princes of Muscovy, as a symbol of the adoption of the new title of Emperor in 1721.

The court jeweller Ekart and Jérémie Pauzié made the Great Imperial Crown for the coronation of Catherine the Great in 1762. The beautiful crown reflects Pauzié’s skilled workmanship. It is adorned with 4,936 diamonds arranged in splendid patterns across the entire surface of the crown. Bordering the edges of the “mitre” are a number of fine, large white pearls. The crown is also decorated with one of the seven historic stones of the Russian Diamond Collection: a large precious red spinel weighing 398.72 carats (79.744 g), which was brought to Russia by Nicholas Spafary, the Russian envoy to China from 1675 to 1678. It is believed to be the second largest spinel in the world.

In formally adopting the Western term “Emperor” for the ruler of Russia, Peter the Great also adopted Western imperial symbols, including the form of the private crowns (Hauskrone) used by the Holy Roman Emperors (of which the only surviving example is the Austrian imperial crown of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II, the Imperial Crown of Austria), in which a circlet with eight fleur-de-lis surrounds a mitre with a high arch extending from the front to the back fleur-de-lis.

Already in Austria some baroque representations of this type of crown found on statues of the saints had already transformed the two halves of the mitre into two half-spheres, and this is the type of imperial crown used in Russia. Emperor Peter’s widow and successor, Empress Catherine I, was the first Russian ruler to wear this form of imperial crown.

In the Great Imperial Crown which the court jewellers Pauzié and J. F. Loubierin made for Empress Catherine II in 1762, these hemispheres are in open metalwork resembling basketwork with the edges of both the hemispheres bordered with a row of 37 very fine, large, white pearls. They rest on a circlet of nineteen diamonds, all averaging over 5 carats (1.0 g) in weight, the largest being the large Indian pear-shaped stone of 12⅝ cts in front, set between two bands of diamonds above and below. Posier showed his creative genius by replacing the eight fleur-de-lis with four pairs of crossed palm branches, while the arch between them is made up of oaks leaves and acorns in small diamonds surrounding a number of large diamonds of various shapes and tints running from the front pair of crossed palms to the back pair of crossed palms, while the basketwork pattern of the two hemispheres are divided by two strips of similar oak leaves and acorns from the two side pairs of palm branches stretching up to the rows of large pearls on their borders.

At the center and apex of the central arch is a diamond rosette of twelve petals from which rises a large red spinel, weighing 398.72 carats (79.744 grams), one of the seven historic stones of the Russian Diamond Collection, which was brought to Russia by Nicholas Spafary, the Russian envoy to China from 1675 to 1678. It is believed to be the second largest spinel in the world.

This spinel, in turn, is surmounted by a cross of five diamonds, representing the Christian faith of the Sovereign, the God-given power of the monarchy and the supremacy of the divine order over earthly power. Except for the two rows of large white pearls the entire surface of the crown is covered with 4936 diamonds and is quite heavy, weighing approximately nine pounds (by contrast, the Crown of Monomakh weighs only two pounds). It was unfinished in time for Catherine’s coronation and the original colored stones (e.g., emeralds in the palm branches and laurel leaves) were replaced with diamonds for the coronation of Emperor Paul I in 1797. It was used at every subsequent coronation until that of Emperor Nicholas II in 1896 and was last in imperial period at the State Opening of the Duma in 1906.

April 19, 1793: Birth of Ferdinand I, Emperor of Austria.

Tags

Emperor Franz I of Austria, Emperor Franz Joseph, Ferdinand I of Austria, Holy Roman Emperor Franz II, Pope Pius VII, Princess Maria Anna of Savoy, Revolutions of 1848

Ferdinand I (April 19, 1793 – June 29, 1875) was the Emperor of Austria from 1835 until his abdication in 1848. As ruler of Austria, he was also President of the German Confederation, King of Hungary, Croatia and Bohemia (as Ferdinand V), King of Lombardy–Venetia and holder of many other lesser titles. Had the Holy Roman Empire not been abolished during the reign of his father, Ferdinand would have reigned as Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand IV.

Ferdinand was the eldest son of Franz II-I, Holy Roman Emperor and Emperor of Austria, and Maria Theresa of Naples and Sicily. Ferdinand’s mother was the eldest of 18 children born to King Ferdinand IV-III of Naples and Sicily (later King Ferdinand I of the Two-Sicilies) and Maria Carolina of Austria, the thirteenth child of Holy Roman Empress Maria Theresa of Austria and Holy Roman Emperor Franz I.

Possibly as a result of his parents’ genetic closeness (they were double first cousins), Ferdinand suffered from epilepsy, hydrocephalus, neurological problems, and a speech impediment. He was educated by Baron Josef Kalasanz von Erberg, and his wife Josephine, by birth a Countess von Attems.

Ferdinand has been depicted as feeble-minded and incapable of ruling. Yet, although he had epilepsy, he kept a coherent and legible diary and has even been said to have had a sharp wit. However, suffering as many as twenty seizures per day severely restricted his ability to rule with any effectiveness. Though he was not declared incapacitated, a Regent’s Council (Archduke Ludwig of Austria-Tuscany, Count Kolowrat, and Prince Metternich) steered the government.

Archduke Ludwig, Prince Royal of Hungary and Bohemia and Prince of Tuscany (1784 – 1864), was the 14th child of Holy Roman Emperor Leopold II, King of Hungary and Bohemia, Grand Duke of Tuscany, and Infanta Maria Luisa of Spain.

When Ferdinand married Princess Maria Anna of Savoy, the court physician considered it unlikely that he would be able to consummate the marriage.

Princess Maria Anna of Savoy

Princess Maria Anna of Savoy was the daughter of King Victor Emmanuel I of Sardinia and of his wife, Archduchess Maria Teresa of Austria-Este, daughter of Archduke Ferdinand of Austria, Maria Beatrice d’Este of Modena. Princess Maria Anna of Savoy had a twin sister Princess Maria Teresa. The two Princesses were baptized by Pope Pius VII. Princess Maria Teresa married Charles Louis, Prince of Lucca.

When Ferdinand and Maria Anna tried to consummate the marriage, he had five seizures. Ferdinand is best remembered for his command to his cook: when told he could not have apricot dumplings (Marillenknödel) because apricots were out of season, he said “I am the Emperor, and I want dumplings!” (German: Ich bin der Kaiser und ich will Knödel!).

In 1848 revolutions swept across Europe. As the revolutionaries were marching on the palace, he is supposed to have asked Metternich for an explanation. When Metternich answered that they were making a revolution, Ferdinand is supposed to have said “But are they allowed to do that?” He was convinced by Prince Felix of Schwarzenberg to abdicate in favour of his nephew, Archduke Franz Joseph (the next in line was Ferdinand’s younger brother Archduke Franz Charles, but he was persuaded to waive his succession rights in favour of his son). The new Emperor, Franz Joseph, would occupy the Austrian throne for the next sixty-eight years.

Ferdinand was the last King of Bohemia to be crowned as such, as King Ferdinand V of Bohemia. Due to his sympathy with Bohemia (where he spent the rest of his life in Prague Castle) he was given the Czech nickname “Ferdinand the Good” In Austria, Ferdinand was similarly nicknamed Ferdinand the Benign.

Ferdinand died on June 29, 1875 and is interred in tomb number 62 in the Imperial Crypt in Vienna.

This date in History: September 10, 1898. Assassination of Empress Elisabeth of Austria

Tags

Austrian Empire, Austro-Hungarian Empire, Elisabeth of Austria, Emperor Franz Joseph, Franz Joseph of Austria-Hungary, Geneva Switzerland, Kingdom of Hungary, Luigi Lucheni

Elisabeth of Bavaria (December 24, 1837 – September 10, 1898) was Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary by marriage to Emperor Franz Joseph of Austria.

Born Elisabeth Amalie Eugenie in Munich, Bavaria, she was the fourth child of Duke Maximilian Joseph in Bavaria and Princess Ludovika of Bavaria, the half-sister of King Ludwig I of Bavaria. Nicknamed Sisi, she enjoyed an informal upbringing before marrying Emperor Franz Joseph I at the age of sixteen. The marriage thrust her into the much more formal Habsburg court life, for which she was unprepared and which she found uncongenial. She came to develop a deep kinship with Hungary, and helped to bring about the dual monarchy of Austria–Hungary in 1867.

Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria

The death of her only son, Crown Prince Rudolph of Austria, and his mistress Mary Vetsera, in a murder–suicide at his hunting lodge at Mayerling in 1889 was a blow from which Elisabeth never recovered. She withdrew from court duties and travelled widely, unaccompanied by her family. In 1890, she had a palace built on the Greek Island of Corfu that she visited often. The palace Achilleion, featuring an elaborate mythological motif, served as a refuge. She was obsessively concerned with maintaining her youthful figure and beauty, which were already legendary during her life. At 172 cm (5 feet 8 inches), Elisabeth was unusually tall. Even after four pregnancies she maintained her weight at approximately 50 kg (110 pounds, 7 st 12 lbs) for the rest of her life. She achieved this through fasting and exercise, such as gymnastics and riding.

Assassination

Elisabeth spent little time in Vienna with her husband. Their correspondence increased during their last years, however, and their relationship became a warm friendship. On her imperial steamer, Miramar, Empress Elisabeth travelled through the Mediterranean. Her favourite places were Cape Martin on the French Riviera, and also Sanremo on the Ligurian Riviera, where tourism had started only in the second half of the nineteenth century; Lake Geneva in Switzerland; Bad Ischl in Austria, where the imperial couple would spend the summer; and Corfu Greece.

In 1898, despite warnings of possible assassination attempts, the 60-year-old Elisabeth traveled incognito to Geneva, Switzerland. However, someone from the Hôtel Beau-Ravage revealed that the Empress of Austria was their guest.

At 1:35 p.m. on Saturday September 10, 1898, Elisabeth and Countess Irma Sztáray de Sztára et Nagymihály, her lady-in-waiting, left the hotel on the shore of Lake Geneva on foot to catch the steamship Genève for Montreux. Since the empress despised processions, she insisted that they walk without the other members of her entourage, including her bodyguards.

They were walking along the promenade when the 25-year-old Italian anarchist Luigi Lucheni approached them, attempting to peer underneath the empress’s parasol. According to Sztáray, as the ship’s bell announced the departure, Lucheni seemed to stumble and made a movement with his hand as if he wanted to maintain his balance. In reality, in an act of “propaganda of the deed”, he had stabbed Elisabeth with a sharpened needle file that was 4 inches (100 mm) long (used to file the eyes of industrial needles) that he had inserted into a wooden handle.

Lucheni originally planned to kill Prince Philippe, Duke of Orléans (1869–1926); but the Pretender to throne of France had left Geneva earlier for the Valais. Failing to find him, the assassin selected Elisabeth when a Geneva newspaper revealed that the elegant woman traveling under the pseudonym of “Countess of Hohenembs” was in fact the Empress Elisabeth of Austria.

After Lucheni struck her, the empress collapsed. A coach driver helped her to her feet and alerted the Austrian concierge of the Beau-Rivage, a man named Planner, who had been watching the empress’s progress toward the Genève. The two women walked roughly 100 yards (91 m) to the gangway and boarded, at which point Sztáray relaxed her hold on Elisabeth’s arm. The empress then lost consciousness and collapsed next to her.

Sztáray called for a doctor, but only a former nurse, a fellow passenger, was available. The boat’s captain, Captain Roux, was ignorant of Elisabeth’s identity and since it was very hot on deck, advised the countess to disembark and take her companion back to her hotel. Meanwhile, the boat was already sailing out of the harbor. Three men carried Elisabeth to the top deck and laid her on a bench. Sztáray opened her dress, cut Elisabeth’s corset laces so she could breathe. Elisabeth revived somewhat and Sztáray asked her if she was in pain, and she replied, “No”. She then asked, “What has happened?”and lost consciousness again.

Countess Sztáray noticed a small brown stain above the empress’s left breast. Alarmed that Elisabeth had not recovered consciousness, she informed the captain of her identity, and the boat turned back to Geneva. Elisabeth was carried back to the Hotel Beau-Rivage by six sailors on a stretcher improvised from a sail, cushions and two oars.

Fanny Mayer, the wife of the hotel director, a visiting nurse, and the countess undressed Elisabeth and removed her shoes, when Sztáray noticed a few small drops of blood and a small wound. When they then removed her from the stretcher to the bed she was clearly dead; Frau Mayer believed the two audible breaths she heard the Empress take as she was brought into the room were her last. Two doctors, Dr. Golay and Dr. Mayer arrived, along with a priest, who was too late to grant her absolution. Mayer incised the artery of her left arm to ascertain death, and found no blood. She was pronounced dead at 2:10 p.m. Everyone knelt down and prayed for the repose of her soul, and Countess Sztáray closed Elisabeth’s eyes and joined her hands.

No matter how reluctant or resentful she was of the title, Elisabeth had been the Empress of Austria for 44 years.

When Franz Joseph received the telegram informing him of Elisabeth’s death, his first fear was that she had committed suicide. It was only when a later message arrived, detailing the assassination, that he was relieved of that notion. The telegram asked permission to perform an autopsy, and the answer was that whatever procedures were prescribed by Swiss Law should be adhered to.

The autopsy was performed the next day by Golay, who discovered that the weapon, which had not yet been found, had penetrated 3.33 inches (85 mm) into Elisabeth’s thorax, fractured the fourth rib, pierced the lung and pericardium, and penetrated the heart from the top before coming out the base of the left ventricle.

On Wednesday morning, Elisabeth’s body was carried back to Vienna aboard a funeral train. The inscription on her coffin read, “Elisabeth, Empress of Austria”. The Hungarians were outraged and the words, “and Queen of Hungary” were hastily added. The entire Austro-Hungarian Empire was in deep mourning; 82 sovereigns and high-ranking nobles followed her funeral cortege on the morning of September 17, to the tomb in the Capuchin Church.

The Assassin

Lucheni was apprehended upon fleeing the scene and his file was found the next day. He told the authorities that he was an anarchist who came to Geneva with the intention of killing any sovereign as an example for others. Lucheni used the file because he didn’t have enough money for a stiletto.

His trial began the next month, in October. He was furious to find that capital punishment had been abolished in Geneva, and wrote a letter demanding that he be tried in another canton, such that he could be martyred. He received the sentence of life imprisonment.

Lucheni wrote his childhood memoirs while in Geneva’s Évêché prison. He was harassed in prison and his notebooks were stolen. He was found hanged in his cell on October 19, 1910. His head was preserved in formaldehyde and transferred to Vienna in 1986.

European History and American Movies

Tags

Archduke Franz Ferdinand, Braveheart, Cate Blanchett, Charlemagne, Elizabeth Woodville, Emperor Franz Joseph, Helen Mirren, Holy Roman Emperor, Iron Man, James Mason, King Baldwin IV, King Edward IV, King Richard I of England, Kings and Queens of England, Queen Victoria, Ray Winstone, Robert Downey Jr, the White Queen, Young Victoria

This post will be a slight change of pace for me. This post will be directed toward my American readers but hopefully my readers from other countries will also appreciate this. Lately I have been watching movies related to the Tudor dynasty, specifically Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. I own and watched the Tudors the Showtime miniseries, the Henry VIII miniseries starring Ray Winstone, the movie Anne of the Thousand Days, and a miniseries on Elizabeth I starring Helen Mirren and the two movies about Elizabeth I starring Cate Blanchett. Also have many more royalty related movies. This did get me thinking about how popular some stories and royal figures are popular here in the US.

Movies such as Braveheart and those based on the character Robin Hood have featured royalty and have done very well. The movie Young Victoria did well here in the United States as did another movie based on Queen Victoria, Her Majesty, Mrs Brown, starring Dame Judi Dench. One of my favorite royalty based movies is Restoration starring Robert Downey Jr (Iron Man) and Sam Neill as Charles II. I recently purchased the 1982 TV movie of Ivanhoe also starring Sam Neill and James Mason and featuring Julian Glover as King Richard I of England. Ridley Scott’s movie Kingdom of Heaven is also one that I enjoy which takes place in the Holy Land during the Crusades and features King Baldwin IV of the European Kingdom of Jerusalem and his battle for the land against the famous Muslim leader, Saladin. Even King Richard I shows up at the end on his way for his historic encounter with Saladin.

I think I have established that movies about European history and European Royalty do play well here in the states. When I look through the movies I own and have seen what strikes me is that there are still many stories that I would love to see that have not been filmed yet.

Here are some of my ideas for movies i would love to see made some day:

1. The life of William the Conqueror. I could see this movie done on an epic scale of Braveheart. To keep it simple I would just focus on the conquest of England itself. But there are many themes to that story to make it interesting. The Battle of Hastings would make for an epic filled battle. Also it would be interesting to film how the Norman army mistook the celebrations during the coronation as some type of rebellion began to set fire to the town!

2. The life of Charlemagne. The King of the Franks who also became the first Holy Roman Emperor and created one of the most powerful empires in Europe. There is a goldmine of stories from his life.

3. The start of World War I. I think you could create a great drama of the tensions between all of the royal heads of states after the assassination of Archduke Franz-Ferdinand.

4. The life of Austrian Emperor Franz-Joseph who saw his wife, son, and great-nephew (the aforementioned Archduke Franz-Ferdinand) all die in his life time amidst tragic circumstances.

5. I would like to see a sequel to Young Victoria and show the circumstances of their relationship and her reaction to the death of her husband, Prince Albert, the Prince Consort.

6. I hope someday they make one more movie with Cate Blanchett as Elizabeth I showing the end of her reign and all the drama that went with it.

Those are just some of the ideas I have floating in my head for feature films…or maybe a miniseries for topics related to royalty. I know that the BBC is producing a miniseries called the White Queen about Elizabeth Woodville the wife of King Edward IV and the tumultuous times of the Wars of the Roses. I am looking forward to seeing that!

Franz Xaver Winterhalter

Tags

Emperor Franz Joseph, Empress Elizabeth of Austria, England, France, Franz Xaver Winterhalter, Louis-Philippe of France, Louise Marie of Orleans, Ludwig I Grand Duke of Baden, Madame Barbe de Rimsky-Korsakov, Mexico and Belgium, Portugal, Prince Albert, Queen of the Belgians, Queen Victoria, Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, Russia, Spain

Back in the late 70s when I began my interest in royalty I soon found myself attracted to the 19th century. Despite my love for modern technology there are times I think I was born in the wrong century. I love looking at old photos from the 19th and early part of the 20th century. Even though the art of photography was growing in the 19th century all types of painting, including portraits, still thrived. For anyone examining royalty in the 19th century sooner or later you will run into the works of Franz Xaver Winterhalter (20 April 1805 – 8 July 1873). He was a German painter from the Grand Duchy of Baden who became one of the most sought after painters at the courts of Europe.

The portrait of Queen Victoria above was not for the public but was commissioned for Prince Albert. I think this portrait is exemplary of his style.

He is by far my favorite painter, besides Bob Ross of course. Winterhalter devoted his life to the study of art. He first attended a school at a Benedictine monastery in St.Blasien. At the age of thirteen he began to study drawing and engraving. In 1825, he was supported by Ludwig I, Grand Duke of Baden (1763–1830) and began a course of study at the Academy of Arts. In 1828 he became drawing master to Sophie, Margravine of Baden and it was here than his association with royal courts began. In 1836 he was able to move to Paris, France and in 1838 his painting of Louise Marie of Orleans, Queen of the Belgians, and her son, Duc de Brabant brought him great notoriety and within a short time he was the court painter for King Louis-Philippe of France.

One of the sad things about Winterhalter’s career is that in artistic circles popularity breeds contempt. His style was uniquely his own although he was influenced by Romanticism which crossed both art and literature. He was not taken seriously in artistic circles and fellow artists and critics dismissed his work as being superficial and an expression of affectation. Since he was painting many royals at court he did flatter them in portrait and was at their mercy to portray them in images which would enhance them in the eyes of their subjects. He was loved in royal circles as he painted The royal families of England, France, Spain, Russia, Portugal, Mexico and Belgium. His style does idealize his subject and there is an air of elegant romanticism to his work. His best work was with the ladies at court. His most famous paintings being those of Empress Elizabeth of Austria, wife of Emperor Franz Joseph. His paintings of the royal men were not as popular.

Madame Barbe de Rimsky-Korsakov

He died of typhus in 1873 at the age of 68. He had a brother, Hermann, who was also a painter who lived until 1891. Another favorite of mine appears above. The lady is not royal, she is Madame Barbe de Rimsky-Korsakov. She was a wife of Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov, a Russian aristocrat, and she and her husband are mentioned in the novel “Anna Karenina” by Leo Tolstoy. She sat for Winterhalter in 1845 and this portrait now sits in the Musee d’Orsay in Paris. After his death his work fell into obscurity and it wasn’t until the mid to late 20th century when his work became acknowledged and celebrated.

Princess Victoria, The Princess Royal

I only posted a couple of portraits so I suggest to my readers to do a google image search to enjoy more of his work.