The Dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire. Part IV. The Rise of Brandenburg-Prussia.

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Archduke of Austria, August II the Strong of Poland, Bohemia and Croatia, Elector of Brandenburg, Frederick I in Prussia, Holy Roman Emperor, House of Habsburg, House of Hohenzollern, King of Hungry, Leopold I, Peace of Westphalia, Thirty Years War

After the Peace of Westphalia and the states within the Empire had greater autonomy we saw the rise of Brandenburg-Prussia which came to rival Austria for supremacy within the Empire.

The Hohenzollern state was then known as Brandenburg-Prussia. Brandenburg-Prussia is the historiographic denomination for the Early Modern realm of the Brandenburgian Hohenzollerns between 1618 and 1701.

The family’s main possessions were the Margraviate of Brandenburg within the Holy Roman Empire and the Duchy of Prussia outside of the Empire, ruled as a personal union.

Based in the Electorate of Brandenburg, the main branch of the Hohenzollern family intermarried with the branch ruling the Duchy of Prussia, and secured succession upon the latter’s extinction in the male line in 1618.

Another consequence of the intermarriage was the incorporation of the lower Rhenish principalities of Cleves, Mark and Ravensberg after the Treaty of Xanten in 1614.

The Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648) was especially devastating. The Elector changed sides three times, and as a result Protestant and Catholic armies swept the land back and forth, killing, burning, seizing men and taking the food supplies.

Friedrich I-III, King in Prussia, Elector of Brandenburg

Upwards of half the population was killed or dislocated. Berlin and the other major cities were in ruins, and recovery took decades. By the Peace of Westphalia, which ended the Thirty Years’ War in 1648, Brandenburg gained Minden and Halberstadt, also the succession in Farther Pomerania (incorporated in 1653) and the Duchy of Magdeburg (incorporated in 1680).

With the Treaty of Bromberg (1657), concluded during the Second Northern War, the electors were freed of Polish vassalage for the Duchy of Prussia and gained Lauenburg–Bütow and Draheim. The Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye (1679) expanded Brandenburgian Pomerania to the lower Oder.

The second half of the 17th century laid the basis for Prussia to become one of the great players in European politics. The emerging Brandenburg-Prussian military potential, based on the introduction of a standing army in 1653, was symbolized by the widely noted victories in Warsaw (1656) and Fehrbellin (1675) and by the Great Sleigh Drive (1678). Brandenburg-Prussia also established a navy and German colonies in the Brandenburger Gold Coast and Arguin.

Friedrich Wilhelm, known as “The Great Elector”, opened Brandenburg-Prussia to large-scale immigration (“Peuplierung”) of mostly Protestant refugees from all across Europe (“Exulanten”), most notably Huguenot immigration following the Edict of Potsdam. Friedrich Wilhelm also started to centralize Brandenburg-Prussia’s administration and reduce the influence of the estates.

In 1701, Friedrich III, Elector of Brandenburg, succeeded in elevating his status to King in Prussia.

Born in Königsberg, Friedrich was the third son of Friedrich Wilhelm, Elector of Brandenburg by his father’s first marriage to Louise Henriette of Orange-Nassau, eldest daughter of Frederick Henry, Prince of Orange and Amalia of Solms-Braunfels. His maternal cousin was King William III of England. Upon the death of his father on April 28, 1688, Friedrich became Elector Friedrich III of Brandenburg and Duke of Prussia. Right after ascending the throne Friedrich founded a new city southerly adjacent to Dorotheenstadt and named it after himself, the Friedrichstadt.

Although he was the Margrave and Prince-Elector of Brandenburg and the Duke of Prussia, Friedrich III desired the more prestigious title of king. However, according to Germanic law at that time, no kingdoms could exist within the Holy Roman Empire, with the exception of the Kingdom of Bohemia which belonged to the Holy Roman Emperor.

Friedrich persuaded Emperor Leopold I to allow Prussia to be elevated to a kingdom by the Crown Treaty of November 16, 1700. This agreement was ostensibly given in exchange for an alliance against King Louis XIV in the War of the Spanish Succession and the provision of 8,000 Prussian troops to Leopold’s service.

Friedrich III argued that Prussia had never been part of the Holy Roman Empire, and he ruled over it with full sovereignty. Therefore, he said, there was no legal or political barrier to letting him rule it as a kingdom. Friedrich was aided in the negotiations by Charles Ancillon.

Friedrich crowned himself on January 18, 1701 in Königsberg. Although he did so with the Emperor’s consent, and also with formal acknowledgement from August II the Strong, Elector of Saxony, who held the title of King of Poland, the Polish-Lithuanian Diet (Sejm) raised objections, and viewed the coronation as illegal.

Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor, King of Hungry, Bohemia and Croatia, Archduke of Austria

In fact, according to the terms of the Treaty of Wehlau and Bromberg, the House of Hohenzollern’s sovereignty over the Duchy of Prussia was not absolute but contingent on the continuation of the male line (in the absence of which the duchy would revert to the Polish crown). Therefore, out of deference to the region’s historic ties to the Polish crown, Friedrich made the symbolic concession of calling himself “King in Prussia” instead of “King of Prussia”.

His royalty was, in any case, limited to Prussia and did not reduce the rights of the Emperor in the portions of his domains that were still part of the Holy Roman Empire. In other words, while he was a king in Prussia, he was still only an elector under the suzerainty of the Holy Roman Emperor in Brandenburg.

Legally, the Hohenzollern state was still a personal union between Brandenburg and Prussia. However, by the time Friedrich crowned himself as king, the emperor’s authority over Brandenburg (and the rest of the empire) was only nominal, and in practice it soon came to be treated as part of the Prussian kingdom rather than as a separate entity.

From 1701 onward, the Hohenzollern domains were referred to as the Kingdom of Prussia, or simply Prussia. Legally, the personal union between Brandenburg and Prussia continued until the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806.

However, by this time the emperor’s overlordship over the empire had become a legal fiction. Hence, after 1701, Brandenburg was de facto treated as part of the Prussian kingdom. Friedrich and his successors continued to centralize and expand the state, transforming the personal union of politically diverse principalities typical for the Brandenburg-Prussian era into a system of provinces subordinate to Berlin.

Franz II, the Last Holy Roman Emperor

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Bohemia, Caroline Charlotte Auguste of Bavaria, Croatia Holy Roman Empire, Elisabeth of Württemberg, Franz I of Austria, Holy Roman Emperor Franz II, Holy Roman Emperor Leopold II, King of Hungry, Maria Ludovika of Austria-Este, Maria Teresa of the Two Sicilies

From the Emperor’s Desk: Tomorrow, August 6th, is the anniversary of the abdication of Holy Roman Emperor Franz II, and also the disillusion of the Holy Roman Empire itself. Today I’m featuring a small biography of Emperor Franz II, and tomorrow I will give a brief telling of the end of the Holy Roman Empire, and starting next week I will do a detailed series on the end of the Holy Roman Empire.

Imperial Standard of the Holy Roman Empire

Franz II (February 12, 1768 – March 2, 1835) was the last Holy Roman Emperor (from 1792 to 1806) and, as Franz I, the first Emperor of Austria, from 1804 to 1835. He also served as the first president of the German Confederation following its establishment in 1815.

Early life

As Archduke Franz of Austria he was a son of Holy Roman Emperor Leopold II (1747–1792) and his wife Infanta Maria Luisa of Spain (1745–1792), daughter of Carlos III of Spain (previously King of Naples and Sicily) and Maria Amalia of Saxony. She was the fifth daughter, and second surviving child, of her parents.

Archduke Franz was born in Florence, the capital of Tuscany, where his father reigned as Grand Duke from 1765 to 1790 prior to his becoming Emperor. Though he had a happy childhood surrounded by his many siblings, his family knew Franz was likely to be a future Emperor (his uncle Emperor Joseph II had no surviving issue from either of his two marriages), and so in 1784 the young Archduke was sent to the Imperial Court in Vienna to educate and prepare him for his future role.

Franz II, Holy Roman Emperor

Emperor Joseph II himself took charge of the development of Archduke Franz. His disciplinarian regime was a stark contrast to the indulgent Florentine Court of Leopold. The Emperor wrote that Archduke Franz was “stunted in growth”, “backward in bodily dexterity and deportment”, and “neither more nor less than a spoiled mother’s child.” Emperor Joseph II concluded that “the manner in which he was treated for upwards of sixteen years could not but have confirmed him in the delusion that the preservation of his own person was the only thing of importance.”

Emperor Joseph II martinet method of improving the young Franz was “fear and unpleasantness.” The young Archduke was isolated, the reasoning being that this would make him more self-sufficient as it was felt by Joseph that Franz “failed to lead himself, to do his own thinking.”

Nonetheless, Franz greatly admired his uncle, if rather feared him. To complete his training, Franz was sent to join an army regiment in Hungary and he settled easily into the routine of military life. He was present at the siege of Belgrade which occurred during the Austro-Turkish War.

After the death of Joseph II in 1790, Franz’s father became Emperor Leopold II. He had an early taste of power while acting as Leopold’s deputy in Vienna while the incoming Emperor traversed the Empire attempting to win back those alienated by his brother’s policies.

The strain told on Leopold and by the winter of 1791, he became ill. He gradually worsened throughout early 1792; on the afternoon of March 1 Leopold died, at the relatively young age of 44. Franz, just past his 24th birthday, was now Holy Roman Emperor Franz II, much sooner than he had expected.

Imperial Crown of the Austrian Empire

Emperor

As the head of the Holy Roman Empire and the ruler of the vast multi-ethnic Habsburg hereditary lands, Emperor Franz II felt threatened by the French revolutionaries and later Napoleon’s expansionism as well as their social and political reforms which were being exported throughout Europe in the wake of the conquering French armies.

Emperor Franz II had a fraught relationship with France. His aunt Archduchess Marie Antoinette, the wife of Louis XVI and Queen consort of France, was guillotined by the revolutionaries in 1793, at the beginning of his reign, although they were not close and on the whole, he was indifferent to her fate.

Emperor Franz II continued his leading role as an opponent of Napoleonic France in the Napoleonic Wars, and suffered several more defeats after the Battle of Austerlitz. The marriage of his daughter Marie Louise of Austria to Napoleon on March 10, 1810 was arguably his severest personal defeat.

After the abdication of Napoleon following the War of the Sixth Coalition, Austria participated as a leading member of the Holy Alliance at the Congress of Vienna, which was largely dominated by Franz’s chancellor Klemens von Metternich culminating in a new European map and the restoration of most of Franz II’s ancient dominions. Due to the establishment of the Concert of Europe, which largely resisted popular nationalist and liberal tendencies, Franz was viewed as a reactionary later in his reign.

Franz I, Emperor of Austria

Franz II’s grandchildren include Napoleon II (Napoleon’s only legitimate son), Franz Joseph I of Austria, Maximilian I of Mexico, Maria II of Portugal and Pedro II of Brazil.

Marriages

Franz II married four times:

1. On January 6, 1788, to Elisabeth of Württemberg (April 21, 1767 – February 18, 1790).

Elisabeth Wilhelmine Luise was born in Treptow an der Rega, Pomerania, in what today is Poland. She was born as the third daughter and eighth child borne to Friedrich II Eugene, Duke of Württemberg and his wife, Princess Sophia Dorothea of Brandenburg-Schwedt. Her name came from her baptism.

At the age of 15, she was called by the Holy Roman Emperor, Joseph II, to Vienna. There, she was educated in the Salesianerinnenkloster by the nuns, in which she also converted to Catholicism. The purpose of this was to make her the future wife of Archduke Franz, the future Holy Roman Emperor.

In Vienna on January 6, 1788, Elisabeth and Franz were married. At this time, Emperor Joseph was in ill health; the young archduchess was close to the emperor and brightened his last years with her youthful charm.

At the end of 1789, Elisabeth became pregnant; however, her condition was very delicate. After her visitation to the anointing of the sick, held by the emperor, on February 15, 1790, Elisabeth fainted—and on the night of February 18, she prematurely gave birth to Archduchess Ludovika Elisabeth, who lived for only 16 months.

Despite an emergency operation to save her life, Elisabeth did not survive the birth, which lasted more than 24 hours. She is buried in the Imperial Crypt, in Vienna. The Emperor Joseph II died two days after the death of his niece.

2. On September 15, 1790, Emperor Franz II was married to his double first cousin Maria Teresa of the Two Sicilies (June 6, 1772 – April 13, 1807), daughter of King Ferdinand I of the Two Sicilies and Archduchess Maria Carolina of Austria (both were grandchildren of Empress Maria Theresa and her husband Emperor Franz I, formerly Duke of Lorraine and they shared all of their other grandparents in common), with whom he had twelve children, of whom only seven reached adulthood.

Born on 6 June 1772 at the Royal Palace of Naples, Maria Theresa Carolina Giuseppina was her mother’s favorite child from birth, and was henceforth named after her maternal grandmother Empress Maria Theresa. Princess Maria Theresa was taught French, mathematics, geography, theology, music, dancing, and drawing.

In the February of 1790, Archduke Franz’s wife, Archduchess Elisabeth, died in childbirth, and it was announced that he would marry one of the princesses of Naples. Maria Theresa and her sister Luisa were both considered for the match. In the end, though, Luisa was chosen to marry Ferdinand III, Grand Duke of Tuscany, and Maria Theresa was to marry Francis. The marriage was in accordance with the traditional Habsburg marriage policy.

Marriage

On September 15, 1790, at the age of 18, Princess Maria Theresa married her double first cousin Archduke Franz. The marriage was described as a happy one based on mutual understanding, despite differences in personality. Franz was described as a melancholic character. He was shy and reserved, and was serious with a preference for a spartan lifestyle and duty. Maria Theresa, on the other hand, was described as a gracious blue-eyed blonde with a vivacious personality, a hot temper and a sensual nature.

Maria Theresa reportedly adapted well to her new home in Vienna and did not suffer from homesickness. She participated with enthusiasm in court life, and it was noted that she enjoyed dancing and partaking in carnival balls—even while pregnant. She particularly enjoyed the Waltz, which had been recently introduced as an innovation and became fashionable during her years in Vienna.

In the winter of 1806, Empress Maria Theresa (pregnant with her 12th child) contracted tuberculous pleurisy, which the imperial physician, Andreas Joseph von Stifft, treated with bloodletting. However, it did not trigger an improvement in health, but a premature birth. When Empress Maria Theresa died after following complications after her last childbirth (the daughter died a few days before the mother) on 13 April 1807 at the age of 34, the Emperor was inconsolable and had to be removed by force from the corpse of his wife. She was buried in the Imperial Crypt in Vienna. The shattered Emperor stayed away from the funeral, instead traveling to Buda with his two eldest children.

3. On January 6, 1808, Emperor Franz of Austria married again to another first cousin, Archduchess Maria Ludovika of Austria-Este (December 14, 1787 – April 7, 1816) with no issue. She was the daughter of Archduke Ferdinand of Austria-Este and Maria Beatrice d’Este, Princess of Modena. She was a member of the House of Austria-Este, a branch of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine.

She is not to be confused with Marie-Louise of Austria (who was given the Latin baptismal name of Maria Ludovica Leopoldina Francisca Theresa Josepha Lucia), who married Napoleon in 1810.

She, as leader of the war party in Austria, was a great enemy of the French Emperor Napoleon I of France and therefore also in opposition to the Austrian foreign minister Prince Klemens Wenzel von Metternich. The French had protested against the marriage because of her political views. She had considerable influence on her husband, and her talent at ruling marvelled many officials, including the Prussian minister who considered her the ruling genius at court.

Maria Ludovika was also immensely popular with her subjects who hailed her a second Maria Theresa. Together with her brother-in-law Archduke Johann, she made the war effort popular. During her coronation in Pressburg, she impressed the Hungarians so much that they declared large financial and military support for the monarchy if needed. But the Emperor hesitated and Archduke Charles who had extensive control over military matters advised caution. Only the effects of the Spanish revolt in 1808 allowed the war party to prevail.

When Napoleon was finally defeated she traveled at the end of the year 1815 to her home country, North Italy, but died of tuberculosis in Verona. She was only 28 years old. She is buried in the Imperial Crypt in Vienna.

4. On October 29, 1816, Franz II married Caroline Charlotte Auguste of Bavaria (8 February 1792 – 9 February 1873) with no issue. She was daughter of Maximilian I Joseph of Bavaria and had been previously married to Wilhelm I of Württemberg.

First marriage

On June 8, 1808, at Munich, Caroline Augusta married Crown Prince Wilhelm of Württemberg (1781–1864) becoming Crown Princess of Württemberg.

Her first marriage was arranged to avoid a political marriage arranged by Napoleon. After the marriage ceremony, her spouse said to her: We are victims to politics. She spent her time writing letters to her brother Ludwig, and learning Italian and English.

The couple never bonded with each other and the marriage was finally annulled by Pope Pius VII to enable both of them to make remarriages that were valid in the Catholic Church. At the time of the annulment, it was claimed by them that they had lived separately in the palace and that the marriage had never been consummated.

Empress

After the annulment of her marriage, Caroline Augusta was considered as a bride for both the Emperor Franz II and his younger brother, Ferdinand. Later, Ferdinand III, Grand Duke of Tuscany withdrew his proposal and Caroline Augusta became the Emperor’s bride.

On October 29, 1816, Caroline Augusta married Franz, Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary and Bohemia and Croatia. She became the fourth wife of the emperor, who was 24 years older than her and had fathered thirteen children by two of his previous wives. The English diplomat Frederick Lamb called the new empress “ugly, clever and amiable,” and the emperor her husband had this to say of her: “She can stand a push, the other was nothing but air.” The wedding, and indeed their married life, was very simple due to the strict economy favoured by the Emperor. Prior to this marriage, Caroline Augusta had always been known as Charlotte, but now she began using the name Caroline.

This marriage, which lasted until the emperor’s death almost 20 years later, was harmonious but remained childless. She became popular in Austria and was active in social work; she founded several hospitals and residences for the poor. After the death of her spouse in 1835, she moved to Salzburg and lived there in quiet dignity until her own death nearly four decades later. The dowager empress died in February 1873, one day after her 81st birthday.

July 26, 1678: Birth of Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor, King of Bohemia, Hungary, Croatia and Archduke of Austria

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Archduke of Austria, Holy Roman Emperor Joseph I, King Louis XIV of France and Navarre, King of Bohemia, King of Croatia, King of Hungry, King Philip IV of Spain, Pope Clement XI, Princess Wilhelmine Amalie of Brunswick-Lüneburg, War of the Spanish Succession

Joseph I (Joseph Jacob Ignaz Johann Anton Eustachius; July 26, 1678 – April 17, 1711) was Holy Roman Emperor and ruler of the Austrian Habsburg monarchy from 1705 until his death in 1711.

He was the eldest son of Emperor Leopold I from his third wife, Eleonor Magdalene of Neuburg, she was the oldest of 17 children born from Philipp Wilhelm, Count Palatine of Neuburg and Duke of Jülich-Berg of the House of Wittelsbach and his second wife, Landgravine Elisabeth Amalie of Hesse-Darmstadt.

On Eleonor Magdalene of Neuburg’s father’s side her grandparents were Wolfgang Wilhelm, Count Palatine of Neuburg and his first wife, Magdalene of Bavaria. On her mother’s side, her grandparents were Georg II, Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt and Sophia Eleonore of Saxony.

Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor, King of Bohemia, Hungary, Croatia and Archduke of Austria

Born in Vienna, Joseph was educated strictly by Charles Theodore, Prince of Salm and became a good linguist. Although he was the first son and child born of his parents’ marriage, he was his father’s third son and seventh child.

Previously, Leopold had been married to Infanta Margaret Theresa of Spain, the first child of King Felipe IV of Spain born from his second marriage with his niece Archduchess Mariana of Austria, second child of Infanta Maria Anna of Spain and her husband Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand. Infanta Margaret Theresa gave him four children, one of whom survived infancy.

Leopold then married his Habsburg cousin Archduchess Claudia Felicitas of Austria. She was the eldest daughter of Ferdinand Charles, Archduke of Further Austria and Count of Tyrol, by his wife and first-cousin Anna de’ Medici.

On her father’s side, her grandparents were Leopold V, Archduke of Further Austria and his wife Claudia de’ Medici (after which she received her first name); on her mother’s side, her grandparents were Cosimo II de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany and his wife Archduchess Maria Magdalena of Austria.

Archduchess Claudia Felicitas gave him two short-lived daughters. Thus, Joseph had six half-siblings.

At the age of nine, on December 9, 1687, he was crowned King of Hungary; and at the age of eleven, on January 23, 1690, King of the Romans. Although he never formally ceased to be a Roman Catholic, Joseph (unlike his parents and most of his other relatives) was not particularly devout by nature. He had two great enthusiasms: music and hunting.

Early on, Joseph’s mother, the Holy Roman Empress Eleonore Magdalene of Neuburg, decided that Wilhelmine Amalie would be her daughter-in-law. Prince Salm was instrumental in speaking for her candidacy.

Princess Wilhelmine Amalie of Brunswick-Lüneburg (April 21, 1673 – April 10, 1742) was the youngest daughter of Johann Friedrich, Duke of Brunswick-Calenberg, and Princess Benedicta Henrietta of the Palatinate.

The adviser of Eleonore, Marco d’Aviano, had convinced her that Wilhelmine Amalie, being pious and older than Joseph, could act as a tempering influence and discontinue his sex life outside of marriage, and to Emperor Leopold, he claimed that he had a vision that the pair would be happy. She was subjected to medical examination, which establish that she was fertile.

Marriage

As a result, on February 24, 1699, she married Archduke Joseph, the heir of Emperor Leopold I. At their wedding, the opera Hercule and Hebe by Reinhard Keiser (1674–1739) was performed.

Princess Wilhelmine Amalie of Brunswick-Lüneburg

As Archduke Joseph and Archduchess Wilhelmine Amalie had three children and their only son died of hydrocephalus before his first birthday.

Joseph had a passion for love affairs (none of which resulted in illegitimate children) and he caught a sexually transmittable disease, probably syphilis, which he passed on to his wife while they were trying to produce a new heir. This incident rendered her sterile.

Emperor Leopold I was still alive during these events, made Joseph and his brother Archduke Charles sign the Mutual Pact of Succession, ensuring that Joseph’s daughters would have absolute precedence over Charles’s daughters, neither of whom were born at the time, and that Joseph’s eldest daughter, Archduchess Maria Josepha, would inherit both the Austrian and Spanish realms. From 1711 to 1717, she was heir presumptive to the Habsburg Empire.

Joseph succeeded to the thrones of Bohemia, Croatia the Holy Roman Empire when his father Emperor Leopold I died on May 5, 1705.

Joseph had surrounded himself with reform-hungry advisors and the young court of Vienna was ambitious in the elaboration of innovative plans. He was described as a “forward-looking ruler”.

The large number of privy councillors was reduced and attempts were made to make the bureaucracy more efficient. Measures were taken to modernize the central bodies and a certain success was achieved in stabilizing the chronic Habsburg finances.

Joseph also endeavoured to strengthen his position in the Holy Roman Empire – as a means of strengthening Austria’s standing as a great power. When he sought to lay claim to imperial rights in Italy and gain territories for the Habsburgs, he even risked a military conflict with the Pope over the duchy of Mantua. Joseph I was threatened with excommunication by Pope Clement XI on June 16, 1708.

Emperor Joseph continued the War of the Spanish Succession, begun by his father against Louis XIV of France, in a fruitless attempt to make his younger brother Archduke Charles (later Emperor Charles VI) King of Spain.

In the process, however, owing to the victories won by his military commander, Prince Eugene of Savoy, he did succeed in establishing Austrian hegemony over Italy. Joseph also had to contend with a protracted revolt in Hungary, fomented by Louis XIV. Neither conflict was resolved until the Treaty of Utrecht, after his death.

During the smallpox epidemic of 1711, which killed Louis, le Grand Dauphin and three siblings of the future Holy Roman Emperor Franz I, Joseph became infected. He died on April 17 in the Hofburg Palace. He had previously promised his wife to stop having affairs, should he survive.

The Emperor was buried in the Imperial Crypt, resting place of the majority of the Habsburgs. His funeral took place on April 20, in tomb no. 35 in Karl’s Vault. His tomb was designed by Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt, decorated with pictures of various battles from the War of Spanish Succession. Josefstadt (the eighth district of Vienna) is named for Joseph.

Emperor Joseph was succeeded as Emperor by his brother Archduke Charles. As Emperor Charles VI he was the last male Habsburg heir in the direct line.

Since Habsburg possessions were subject to the Salic law, barring women from inheriting in their own right, his own lack of a male heir meant the hereditary Habsburg lands would be divided on his death.

The Pragmatic Sanction of April 19, 1713 abolished male-only succession in all Habsburg realms and declared their lands indivisible, and allowed female succession, although only Hungary approved it in 1723.

The Holy Roman Empire was technically elective and still subject to the Salic Law and not subject to the Pragmatic Sanction.

Emperor Joseph’s eldest daughter Archduchess Maria Josepha was the Queen of Poland and Electress of Saxony by marriage to Elector Augustus III of Saxony and King of Poland.

Her sister Archduchess Maria Amalia became the wife of Charles Albert of Bavaria was born in Brussels and the son of Maximilian II Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria, and Theresa Kunegunda Sobieska, daughter of King John III Sobieski of Poland.

Elector Charles Albert of Bavaria was a member of the House of Wittelsbach. After the death of Emperor Charles VI in 1740, he claimed the Archduchy of Austria by his marriage to Archduchess Maria Amalia.

Charles Albert was briefly, from 1741 to 1743, as Charles III King of Bohemia and Croatia. In 1742, he was elected Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire as Charles VII and ruled until his death three years later.

His election as Holy Roman Emperor thus marked the end of three centuries of uninterrupted Habsburg imperial rule although he was related to the Habsburgs by both blood and, as we have seen, by marriage to Archduchess Maria Amalia, the youngest daughter of Emperor Joseph I.