Accession of Queen Anne of Great Britain and Ireland. Conclusion

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Archduke Charles of Austria, Duke of Marlborough, Electress Sophia of Hanover, King Carlos II of Spain, King Felipe V of Spain, King George I of Great Britain, Philippe of Anjou, Queen Anne of Great Britain and Ireland, Sarah Churchill, Treaty of Utrecht, War of the Spanish Succession

The War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1715) was a conflict involving many of the leading European powers that was triggered by the death in November 1700 of the childless Carlos II of Spain.

Prince Louis, The Grand Dauphin, had the strongest genealogical claim to the Spanish throne held by King Carlos II who was his maternal uncle. The Grand Dauphin was the son and heir-apparent of King Louis XIV of France and Navarre.

However, since neither the Grand Dauphin nor his eldest son, Louis, Duke of Burgundy, could be displaced from the succession to the French throne, King Carlos II named the Philippe, Duke of Anjou as his heir. The Duke of Anjou was the second son of Louis, Grand Dauphin, Duke of Anjou as his heir-presumptive.

If Philippe, Duke of Anjou refused the crown, the alternative was Archduke Charles of Austria, younger son of Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor.

King Felipe V of Spain

Having accepted, Philippe was proclaimed King Felipe V of an undivided Spanish Empire on November 16, 1700. The proclamation led to war, with France and Spain on one side and the Grand Alliance on the other to maintain the separation of the Spanish and French thrones.

At issue wasn’t just who had hereditary right to the Spanish throne; at it’s heart was to established the principle that dynastic rights were secondary to maintaining the balance of power between different countries.

As the expensive War of the Spanish Succession grew unpopular, so did the Whig administration. The impeachment of Henry Sacheverell, a high church Tory Anglican who had preached anti-Whig sermons, led to further public discontent.

Anne thought Sacheverell ought to be punished for questioning the Glorious Revolution, but that his punishment should only be a mild one to prevent further public commotion.

In London, riots broke out in support of Sacheverell, but the only troops available to quell the disturbances were Anne’s guards, and Secretary of State Sunderland was reluctant to use them and leave the Queen less protected.

Anne declared God would be her guard and ordered Sunderland to redeploy her troops. In line with Anne’s views, Sacheverell was convicted, but his sentence—suspension of preaching for three years—was so light as to render the trial a mockery.

The Queen, increasingly disdainful of the Marlboroughs and her ministry, finally took the opportunity to dismiss Sunderland in June 1710.

Godolphin followed in August. The Junto Whigs were removed from office, although Marlborough, for the moment, remained as commander of the army. In their place, she appointed a new ministry headed by Harley, which began to seek peace with France.

Unlike the Whigs, Harley and his ministry were ready to compromise by giving Spain to the Bourbon claimant, Philippe of Anjou, in return for commercial concessions. In the parliamentary elections that soon followed his appointment, Harley, aided by government patronage, secured a large Tory majority.

In January 1711, Anne forced Sarah to resign her court offices, and Abigail took over as Keeper of the Privy Purse. Harley was stabbed by a disgruntled French refugee, the Marquis de Guiscard, in March, and Anne wept at the thought he would die. He recovered slowly. Godolphin’s death from natural causes in September 1712 reduced Anne to tears; she blamed their estrangement on the Marlboroughs.

Holy Roman Emperor Joseph I, died in April 1711and his brother Archduke Charles of Austria, succeeded him in Austria, Hungary and the Holy Roman Empire as Emperor Charles VI.

To also give him the Spanish throne was no longer in Britain’s interests, but the proposed Peace of Utrecht submitted to Parliament for ratification did not go as far as the Whigs wanted to curb Bourbon ambitions.

In the House of Commons, the Tory majority was unassailable, but the same was not true in the House of Lords. The Whigs secured the support of the Earl of Nottingham against the treaty by promising to support his Occasional Conformity bill.

Seeing a need for decisive action to erase the anti-peace majority in the House of Lords, and seeing no alternative, Anne reluctantly created twelve new peers, even though such a mass creation of peers was unprecedented.

Abigail’s husband, Samuel Masham, was made a baron, although Anne protested to Harley that she “never had any design to make a great lady of [Abigail], and should lose a useful servant”. On the same day, Marlborough was dismissed as commander of the army. The peace treaty was ratified and Britain’s military involvement in the War of the Spanish Succession ended.

By signing the Treaty of Utrecht, King Louis XIV of France recognised the Hanoverian succession in Britain. Nevertheless, gossip that Anne and her ministers favoured the succession of her Catholic half-brother, Prince James Francis, Prince of Wales rather than the Hanoverians continued, despite Anne’s denials in public and in private.

The rumours were fed by her consistent refusals to permit any of the Hanoverians to visit or move to England, and by the intrigues of Harley and the Tory Secretary of State Lord Bolingbroke, who were in separate and secret discussions with her half-brother about a possible Stuart restoration until early 1714.

Death

Anne was unable to walk between January and July 1713. At Christmas, she was feverish, and lay unconscious for hours, which led to rumours of her impending death. She recovered, but was seriously ill again in March.

By July, Anne had lost confidence in Harley; his secretary recorded that Anne told the cabinet “that he neglected all business; that he was seldom to be understood; that when he did explain himself, she could not depend upon the truth of what he said; that he never came to her at the time she appointed; that he often came drunk; [and] last, to crown all, he behaved himself towards her with ill manner, indecency and disrespect.”

On July 27, 1714, during Parliament’s summer recess, she dismissed Harley as Lord Treasurer. Despite failing health, which her doctors blamed on the emotional strain of matters of state, she attended two late-night cabinet meetings that failed to determine Harley’s successor.

A third meeting was cancelled when she became too ill to attend. She was rendered unable to speak by a stroke on July 30, 1714, the anniversary of Gloucester’s death, and on the advice of the Privy Council handed the treasurer’s staff of office to Whig grandee Charles Talbot, 1st Duke of Shrewsbury.

Anne died around 7:30 a.m. on August 1, 1714. John Arbuthnot, one of her doctors, thought her death was a release from a life of ill-health and tragedy; he wrote to Jonathan Swift, “I believe sleep was never more welcome to a weary traveller than death was to her.”

She was buried beside her husband and children in the Henry VII Chapel on the South Aisle of Westminster Abbey on August 24.

Succession

The Electress Sophia of Hanover had died on May 28, two months before Anne, so the Electress’s son, Georg Ludwig, Elector of Hanover, succeeded to the British throne as King George of Great Britain and Ireland pursuant to the Act of Settlement 1701.

The possible Catholic claimants, including Anne’s half-brother, James Francis, Prince of Wales were ignored. The Elector’s accession was relatively stable: a Jacobite rising in 1715 failed. Marlborough was reinstated, and the Tory ministers were replaced by Whigs.

Accession of Queen Anne of Great Britain and Ireland. Part VII

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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.

December 19, 1683: Birth of Felipe V, King of Spain

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Carlos II of Spain, Felipe V of Spain, Fernando VI of Spain, House of Bourbon, Louis XIV of France, Luis of Spain, Philippe of Anjou, Treaty of Utrecht, War of the Spanish Succession

Felipe V (December 19, 1683 – July 9, 1746) was King of Spain from November 1, 1700 to January 14, 1724, and again from September 6, 1724 to his death in 1746. Felipe V instigated many important reforms in Spain, most especially the centralization of power of the monarchy and the suppression of regional privileges, via the Nueva Planta decrees, and restructuring of the administration of the Spanish Empire on the Iberian peninsula and its overseas regions.

Philippe was born at the Palace of Versailles in France as the second son of Louis, Grand Dauphin, the heir apparent to the throne of France, (son of Louis XIV) and his wife Maria Anna Victoria of Bavaria, known as the Dauphine Victoire. He was a younger brother of Louis, Duke of Burgundy, the father of Louis XV of France. At birth, Philippe was created Duke of Anjou, a traditional title for younger sons in the French royal family. He would be known by this name until he became the King of Spain. Since Philippe’s older brother, the Duke of Burgundy, was second in line to the French throne after his father, there was little expectation that either he or his younger brother Charles, Duke of Berry, would ever rule over France.

In 1700, King Carlos II of Spain, the last Habsburg to rule Spain, died childless. His will named as successor Philippe, grandson of Charles’ half-sister Maria Theresa, the first wife of Louis XIV. Upon any possible refusal, the Crown of Spain would be offered next to Philippe’s younger brother, the Duke of Berry, then to the Archduke Charles of Austria, later Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI. Philippe had the better genealogical claim to the Spanish throne, because his Spanish grandmother and great-grandmother were older than the ancestors of the Archduke Charles of Austria.

However, the Austrians maintained that Philip’s grandmother had renounced the Spanish throne for herself and her descendants as part of her marriage contract. The French claimed that it was on the basis of a dowry that had never been paid.

After a long Royal Council meeting in France at which the Dauphin spoke up in favor of his son’s rights, it was agreed that Philippe would ascend the throne, but he would forever renounce his claim to the throne of France for himself and his descendants. The Royal Council decided to accept the provisions of the will of Carlos II naming Philippe, King of Spain, and the Spanish ambassador was called in and introduced to the new king. The ambassador, along with his son, knelt before the new King Felipe V and made a long speech in Spanish, which Felipe did not understand.

First marriage

On November 2, 1701, the almost 18-year-old Felipe V married the 13-year-old Maria Luisa of Savoy, as chosen by his grandfather King Louis XIV. She was the daughter of Victor Amadeus II, Duke of Savoy, and his wife Anne Marie d’Orléans, Felipe’s first cousin once removed. The Duke and Duchess of Savoy were also the parents of Princess Marie Adélaïde of Savoy, Duchess of Burgundy, Felipe’s sister-in-law. There was a proxy ceremony at Turin, the capital of the Duchy of Savoy, and another one at Versailles on September 11.

Proclamation of Felipe V as King of Spain in the Palace of Versailles on November 16, 1700.

Felipe V’s accession in Spain provoked the 13-year War of the Spanish Succession, which continued until the Treaty of Utrecht forbade any future possibility of unifying the French and Spanish crowns while confirming his accession to the throne of Spain. It also removed the Spanish Netherlands and Spanish-controlled Italy from the Spanish monarchy.

Second Marriage

Shortly after the death of Queen Maria Luisa in 1714, the King decided to marry again. His second wife was Elisabeth of Parma, daughter of Odoardo Farnese, Hereditary Prince of Parma, and Dorothea Sophie of the Palatinate. At the age of 22, on 24 December 1714, she was married to the 31-year-old Felipe V by proxy in Parma. The marriage was arranged by Cardinal Alberoni, with the concurrence of the Princesse des Ursins, the Camarera mayor de Palacio (“chief of the household”) of the king of Spain.

On January 14, 1724, Felipe V abdicated the throne to his eldest son, the seventeen-year-old Luis, for reasons still subject to debate. One theory suggests that Felipe V, who exhibited many elements of mental instability during his reign, did not wish to reign due to his increasing mental decline. A second theory puts the abdication in context of the Bourbon dynasty.

The French royal family recently had lost many legitimate agnates to diseases. Indeed, Felipe V’s abdication occurred just over a month after the death of Philippe II, the Duke of Orléans, who had been regent for Louis XV of France.

The lack of an heir made another continental war of succession a possibility. Felipe V was a legitimate descendant of Louis XIV, but matters were complicated by the Treaty of Utrecht, which forbade a union of the French and Spanish crowns. The theory supposes that Felipe V hoped that by abdicating the Spanish crown he could circumvent the Treaty and succeed to the French throne.

In any case, Luis died on August 31, 1724 in Madrid of smallpox, having reigned only seven months and leaving no issue. Felipe was forced to return to the Spanish throne as his younger son, the later Fernando VI, was not yet of age.

During Felipe V’s second reign, Spain began to recover from the stagnation it had suffered during the twilight of the Spanish Habsburg dynasty. Although the population of Spain grew, the financial and taxation systems were archaic and the treasury ran deficits. The king employed thousands of highly paid retainers at his palaces—not to rule the country but to look after the royal family. The army and bureaucracy went months without pay and only the shipments of silver from the New World kept the system going. Spain suspended payments on its debt in 1739—effectively declaring bankruptcy.

Death

Felipe V was afflicted by fits of manic depression and increasingly fell victim to a deep melancholia. His second wife, Elizabeth Farnese, completely dominated her passive husband. She bore him further sons, including another successor, Carlos III of Spain. Beginning in August 1737 his affliction was eased by the castrato singer Farinelli, who, became the “Musico de Camara of Their Majesties.” Farinelli would sing eight or nine arias for the king and queen every night, usually with a trio of musicians.

Felipe V died on July 9, 1746 in El Escorial, in Madrid, but was buried in his favorite Royal Palace of La Granja de San Ildefonso, near Segovia. Fernando VI of Spain, his son by his first queen Maria Luisa of Savoy, succeeded him.

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

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Emperor Joseph I, Emperor Leopold I, Felipe V of Spain, Holy Roman Emperor, Holy Roman Empire, House of Habsburg, Louis XIV of France and Navarre, Romani, War of the Spanish Succession, Wilhelmine Amalie of Brunswick-Lüneburg

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 (Hereditary lands outside the empire) from 1705 until his death in 1711. He was the eldest son of Emperor Leopold I from his third wife, Eleonor Magdalene of Neuburg, the oldest of 17 children born from Philipp Wilhelm, Count Palatine of Neuburg and Duke of Jülich-Berg and his second wife, Landgravine Elisabeth Amalie of Hesse-Darmstadt. On Eleonor Magdalene 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.

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 Mariana of Austria. Leopold was Margaret Theresa of Spain’s maternal uncle and paternal cousin and gave Emperor Leopold four children, one of whom survived infancy. Leopold then married Claudia Felicitas of Austria, eldest daughter of Ferdinand Charles, Archduke of Further Austria and Count of Tyrol, by his wife and first-cousin Anna de’ Medici. Leopold and Claudia Felicitas were second cousins (both being great-grandchildren of Charles II, Archduke of Inner Austria).Claudia Felicitas gave Leopold two short-lived daughters. Thus, Joseph had six half-siblings.

Prior to his ascension, 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.

On February 24, 1699, Joseph married Wilhelmine Amalia of Brunswick-Lüneburg, the youngest daughter of Johann Friedrich, Duke of Brunswick-Calenberg, and Princess Benedicta Henrietta of the Palatinate. At their wedding in Vienna, the opera Hercule and Hebe by Reinhard Keiser (1674–1739) was performed.

Early on, the Joseph’s mother, 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. 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 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.

Joseph and Wilhelmine Amalie had three children and their only son, Archduke Leopold Joseph of Austria (October 29, 1700 – August 4, 1701); died of hydrocephalus before his first birthday. His eldest daughter Archduchess Maria Josepha (December 8, 1699 – November 17, 1757); married August III, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania. His youngest daughter, Archduchess Maria Amalia (October 22, 1701 – December 11, 1756); married her Wittelsbach cousin, Prince-Elector Charles Albert of Bavaria who became Holy Roman Emperor Charles VII in 1742.

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. Joseph’s father, Emperor Leopold, who was still alive during these events, made Joseph and his brother Charles sign the Mutual Pact of Succession, ensuring that Joseph’s daughters would have absolute precedence over Charles’s daughters, neither of whom was born at the time, and that Maria Josepha would inherit both the Austrian and Spanish realms.

Joseph was crowned King of Hungary at the age of nine in 1687 and was elected King of the Romans (as heir to the Holy Roman Empire) at the age of eleven in 1690. He succeeded to the thrones of Bohemia and the Holy Roman Empire when his father died.

At this point in the history of the Holy Roman Empire the Emperor’s power were minimal as most states within the empire had become automenous after the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648. Therefore, Joseph endeavoured to strengthen his position within the Holy Roman Empire – as a means of strengthening Austria’s standing as a great power.

When Joseph 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.

After becoming 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 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.

When Emperor Joseph I died in 1711, Archduke Charles succeeded his brother as emperor, and the new British government initiated peace talks to end the War of the Spanish Succession. The majority of nations participating in the war did not desire to see the Imperial Crown and the Spanish Crown reuniting under Charles VI recreating the vast Habsburg Empire as it was under Emperor Charles V who was also Carlos I of Spain. This resulted in the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht, followed by the 1714 Treaties of Rastatt and Baden, confirming Philippe of Anjou, grandson of King Louis XIV of France and Navarre, as King Felipe V of Spain. This began the House of Bourbon’s tenure on the Spanish throne.

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. He also sanctioned the extermination of Romani people within the Holy Roman Empire.

In Hungary, Joseph had inherited the kuruc rebellion from his father Leopold I: once again, nobles in Transylvania (Siebenbürgen) had risen against Habsburg rule, even advancing for a time as far as Vienna. Although Joseph was compelled to take military action, he refrained – unlike his predecessors – from seeking to teach his subjects a lesson by executing the leaders. Instead, he agreed to a compromise peace, which in the long term facilitated the integration of Hungary into the Habsburg domains.

Hungary was disturbed by the conflict with Francis Rákóczi II, who eventually took refuge in the Ottoman Empire. The emperor reversed many of the authoritarian measures of his father, thus helping to placate opponents. He began the attempts to settle the question of the Austrian inheritance by a pragmatic sanction, which was continued by his brother Charles VI.

In 1710, Joseph extended his father’s edict of outlawry against the Romani (Gypsies) in the Habsburg lands. Per Leopold, any Romani who entered the kingdom was to be declared an outlaw by letters patent and if the same person returned to Bohemia a second time “treated with all possible severity”.

Joseph ordered that in the Kingdom of Bohemia they were to have their right ears cut off; in the March of Moravia, the left ear was to be cut off; in Austria, they would be branded on the back with a branding iron, representing the gallows.

These mutilations were to enable the authorities to identify Romani who had been outlawed and returned. Joseph’s edict specified “that all adult males were to be hanged without trial, whereas women and young males were to be flogged and banished forever.” Officials who failed to enforce the edict could be fined 100 Reichsthaler. Helping Romani was punishable by a half-year’s forced labor. “Mass killings” of Romani were reported as a result.

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.

October 20, 1685: Death of Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor.

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Empress Maria-Theresa of Austria, Holy Roman Emperor, Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, Holy Roman Empire, House of Habsburg, King Carlos II of Spain, King Felipe VI of Spain, Pragmatic Sanction, War of the Austrian Succession, War of the Spanish Succession

Charles VI (October 1, 1685 – October 20, 1740) was Holy Roman Emperor and ruler of the Austrian Habsburg Monarchy from 1711 until his death, succeeding his elder brother, Joseph I. Archduke Charles was the second son of Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I and of his third wife, Princess Eleonor Magdalene of Neuburg, Archduke Charles was born on October 1, 1685. His tutor was Anton Florian, Prince of Liechtenstein.

Following the death of Carlos II of Spain, in 1700, without any direct heir, Charles declared himself King of Spain—both were members of the House of Habsburg. The ensuing War of the Spanish Succession, which pitted France’s candidate, Philippe, Duke of Anjou, Louis XIV of France’s grandson, against Austria’s Charles, lasted for almost 14 years. The Kingdom of Portugal, Kingdom of England, Scotland, Ireland and the majority of the Holy Roman Empire endorsed Charles’s candidature.

Carlos III, as he was known, disembarked in his kingdom in 1705, and stayed there for six years, only being able to exercise his rule in Catalonia, until the death of his brother, Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor; he returned to Vienna to assume the imperial crown.

Not wanting to see Austria and Spain in personal union again, the new Kingdom of Great Britain withdrew its support from the Austrian coalition, and the war culminated with the Treaties of Utrecht and Rastatt three years later. The former, ratified in 1713, recognised the Duke of Anjou as King Felipe V of Spain; however, the Kingdom of Naples, the Duchy of Milan, the Austrian Netherlands and the Kingdom of Sardinia – all previously possessions of the Spanish—were ceded to Austria.

To prevent a union of Spain and France, Felipe was forced to renounce his right to succeed his grandfather’s throne. Charles was extremely discontented at the loss of Spain, and as a result, he mimicked the staid Spanish Habsburg court ceremonial, adopting the dress of a Spanish monarch, which, according to British historian Edward Crankshaw, consisted of “a black doublet and hose, black shoes and scarlet stockings”.

Charles’s father and his advisors went about arranging a marriage for him. Their eyes fell upon Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, the eldest daughter of Louis Rudolph, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and his wife Princess Christine Louise of Oettingen-Oettingen. On August 1, 1708, in Barcelona, Charles married her by proxy. 

Succession to the Habsburg dominions

When Charles succeeded his brother in 1711, he was the last male Habsburg heir in the direct line. Since Habsburg possessions were subject to Salic law, barring women from inheriting in their own right, his own lack of a male heir meant they 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, although Hungary only approved it in 1723.

Charles had three daughters, Maria Theresa (1717-1780), Maria Anna (1718-1744) and Maria Amalia (1724-1730) but no surviving sons.

When Maria Theresa was born, he disinherited his nieces and the daughters of his elder brother, Emperor Joseph I, Maria Josepha and Maria Amalia. It was this act that undermined the chances of a smooth succession and obliged Charles to spend the rest of his reign seeking to ensure enforcement of the Sanction from other European powers.

In total, Great Britain, France, Saxony-Poland, the Dutch Republic, Spain, Venice, States of the Church, Prussia, Russia, Denmark, Savoy-Sardinia, Bavaria, and the Diet of the Holy Roman Empire recognised the sanction. France, Spain, Saxony-Poland, Bavaria and Prussia later reneged. Charles died in 1740, sparking the War of the Austrian Succession, which plagued his successor, Maria Theresa, for eight years.

At the time of Charles’ death, the Habsburg lands were saturated in debt; the exchequer contained a mere 100,000 florins; and desertion was rife in Austria’s sporadic army, spread across the Empire in small, ineffective barracks. Contemporaries expected that Austria-Hungary would wrench itself from the Habsburg yoke upon his death.

Despite the predicaments faced by Charles, the territorial extent of his Habsburg lands was at its greatest since the days of his cognatic ancestor Emperor Charles V, reaching the Southern Mediterranean and including the Duchy of Milan.

The Emperor, after a hunting trip across the Hungarian border in “a typical day in the wettest and coldest October in memory”, fell seriously ill at the Favorita Palace, Vienna, and he died on October 20, 1740 in the Hofburg. In his Memoirs Voltaire wrote that Charles’ death was caused by consuming a meal of death cap mushrooms. Charles’ life opus, the Pragmatic Sanction, was ultimately in vain.

Maria Theresa was forced to resort to arms to defend her inheritance from the coalition of Prussia, Bavaria, France, Spain, Saxony and Poland—all party to the sanction—who assaulted the Austrian frontier weeks after her father’s death. During the ensuing War of the Austrian Succession, Maria Theresa saved her crown and most of her territory but lost the mineral-rich Duchy of Silesia to Prussia and the Duchy of Parma to Spain.

August 16, 1682: Birth of Louis, Duke of Burgundy, “Petit Dauphin” of France.

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Duke of Burgundy, Felipe V of Spain, Henry IV of France, King Charles I of England, Louis of Burgundy, Louis XIV, Louis XV of France., Philip of Anjou, War of the Spanish Succession

Louis, Duke of Burgundy (August 16, 1682 – February 18, 1712), was the eldest son of Louis, Grand Dauphin, and grandson of the reigning French monarch, King Louis XIV of France and Navarre. He was known as the “Petit Dauphin” to distinguish him from his father, until his father died in April 1711. At that time he became the official Dauphin of France. He died in 1712 before his grandfather, the King. Upon the death of Louis XIV in 1715, the Duke of Burgundy’s son became King Louis XV.

Louis, Duke of Burgundy, “Petit Dauphin” of France

Louis was born in the Palace of Versailles, the eldest son of the young 21-year-old Dauphin, Louis, who would later be called le Grand Dauphin, and his wife, Maria Anna Victoria of Bavaria, the eldest daughter of Ferdinand-Maria, Elector of Bavaria and his wife Princess Henriette-Adelaide of Savoy. Her maternal grandparents were Victor-Amadeus I, Duke of Savoy and Christine-Marie of France, the second daughter of Henri IV of France and Marie de’ Medici, thus her husband the dauphin was her second cousin.

Louis’s father was the eldest son of King Louis XIV of France, by then at the height of his powers at age 44. At birth, he received the title of Duke of Burgundy (duc de Bourgogne). In addition, as the son of the Dauphin and grandson to the king, he was a fils de France and also second in the line of succession to his grandfather, Louis XIV after his father.

Louis XIV, King of France and Navarre. (Grandfather)

Louis grew up with his younger brothers: Philippe, Duke of Anjou, who became King Felipe V of Spain; and Charles, Duke of Berry, under the supervision of the royal governess Louise de Prie. He lost his mother when he was eight. His father, viewed as lazy and dull, never played a major role in politics.

At the age of 15, Louis, Duke of Burgundy, was married to Marie-Adélaïde of Savoy (December 6, 1685 – February 12, 1712) the eldest daughter of Victor-Amadeus II, Duke of Savoy, and of Anne-Marie d’Orléans. Anne-Marie d’Orléans was the daughter of Philippe I, Duke of Orléans and Henrietta of England. Philippe I, Duke of Orléans was the younger brother of Louis XIV. Henrietta of England was the youngest daughter of Charles I of England and Henrietta-Maria of France who was the youngest daughter of Henri IV of France (Henri III of Navarre) and his second wife, Marie de’ Medici.

Marie-Adélaïde of Savoy

This made Louis, Duke of Burgundy, and Marie-Adélaïde of Savoy were second cousins. This match had been decided as part of the Treaty of Turin, which ended Franco-Savoyard conflicts during the Nine Years’ War. The wedding took place on December 7, 1697 at the Palace of Versailles.

Military career and politics

In 1702, at the age of twenty, Louis was admitted by his grandfather King Louis XIV to the Conseil d’en haut (High Council), which was in charge of state secrets regarding religion, diplomacy and war. His father had been admitted only at the age of thirty.

In 1708, during the War of the Spanish Succession, Louis was given command of the army in Flanders, with the experienced soldier Louis-Joseph, Duke of Vendôme, (great-grandson of Henri IV of France via an illegitimate line) serving under him. The uncertainty as to which of the two should truly command the army led to delays and the need to refer decisions to Louis XIV.

Continued indecision led to French inactivity as messages travelled between the front and Versailles; the Allies were then able to take the initiative. The culmination of this was the Battle of Oudenarde, where Louis’s mistaken choices and reluctance to support Vendôme led to a decisive defeat for the French. In the aftermath of the defeat, his hesitation to relieve the Siege of Lille led to the loss of the city and thereby allowed the Allies to make their first incursions onto French soil.

Louis, le Grand Dauphin. (Father)

Maria Anna Victoria of Bavaria (Mother)

Louis was influenced by the dévots and was surrounded by a circle of people known as the faction de Bourgogne (Burgundy’s faction), which was most notably made up of his old tutor François Fénelon, his old governor Paul de Beauvilliers, Duke of Saint-Aignan and his brother-in-law Charles Honoré d’Albert, Duke of Chevreuse, as well as the renowned memorialist, Louis de Rouvroy, Duke of Saint-Simon.

These high-ranking aristocrats sought a return to a monarchy less absolute and less centralised, with more powers granted to the individual provinces. Their view was that government should work through councils and intermediary organs between the king and the people. These intermediary councils were to be made up not by commoners from the bourgeoisie (like the ministers appointed by Louis XIV) but by aristocrats who perceived themselves as the representatives of the people and would assist the king in governance and the exercise of power. Had Louis succeeded to the throne, he might have applied this concept of monarchy.

Death and legacy

Louis became Dauphin of France upon the death of his father in 1711. In February 1712, his wife contracted measles and died on February 12. Louis himself, who dearly loved his wife and who had stayed by her side throughout the fatal illness, caught the disease and died six days after her at the Château de Marly on February 18, aged 29. Both of his sons also became infected. The elder, Louis, Duke of Brittany, the latest in a series of Dauphins, succumbed to the disease on March 8, leaving his brother, the two-year-old Louis, Duke of Anjou, who was later to succeed to the throne as Louis XV.

Since, however, it was thought that the chances of survival of this frail child, now heir apparent to his seventy-three-year-old great grandfather, were minimal, a potential succession crisis loomed.

Moreover, overnight the broad hopes of the faction de Bourgogne were destroyed and its members would soon die of natural deaths. Nonetheless, some of their ideas were put into practice when, Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, as regent during Louis XV’s minority, created a form of government known as polysynody, where each ministry was replaced by a council composed of aristocrats. However, the absenteeism, ineptitude and squabbling of the aristocrats caused this system to fail, and it was soon abandoned in 1718 in favour of a return to absolute monarchy.
Issue

1. Louis, Duke of Brittany (June 25, 1704 – April 13, 1705) died of convulsions;
2. Louis, Duke of Brittany (January 9, 1707 – March 8, 1712) died of measles;
3. Louis XV of France (February 15, 1710 – 10 May 1774) first engaged to Infanta Mariana-Victoria of Spain; married Marie Leszczyńska and had issue; died of smallpox.

July 12, 1651: Birth of Infanta Margaret Theresa of Spain. Part II.

Tags

Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria, Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, Holy Roman Empire, House of Bourbon, House of Habsburg, King Louis XIV of France, Margaret Theresa of Spain, Philip IV of Spain, Philip V of Spain, War of the Spanish Succession

Holy Roman Empress and German Queen

The Infanta Margaret-Theresa formally entered Vienna On December 5, 1666. The official marriage ceremony was celebrated seven days later. The Viennese celebrations of the imperial marriage were among the most splendid of all the Baroque era, and lasted almost two years.

The Emperor Leopold ordered the construction of an open-air theatre near the present Burggarten, with a capacity of 5,000 people. For Margaret-Theresa’s birthday in July 1668, the theatre hosted the premiere of the opera Il pomo d’oro (The Golden Apple). Composed by Antonio Cesti, the opera was called the “staging of the century” by contemporaries due to its magnificence and expense. The year before, the Emperor gave an equestrian ballet where he personally mounted on his horse, Speranza; due to technical adaptations, the ballet gave spectators the impression that horses and carriages were hovering in the air.

Margaret-Theresa, Holy Roman Empress

Despite the age difference, Leopold was 26 and Margaret-Theresa was 15 at the time of the marriage, according to contemporaries they had a happy marriage. The Empress always called her husband “Uncle” and he called her “Gretl”. The couple had many common interests, especially in art and music.

During her six years of marriage, Margaret gave birth to four children, of whom only one survived infancy:

* Ferdinand Wenceslaus Joseph Michael Eleazar (1667-1668), Archduke of Austria.
* Maria Antonia Josepha Benedicta Rosalia Petronella (1669-1692), Archduchess of Austria, who inherited her mother’s claims to the Spanish throne, married Maximilian II Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria and was the mother of Joseph-Ferdinand of Bavaria.
* John Leopold (born and died 20 February 1670), Archduke of Austria.
* Maria Anna Josepha Antonia Apollonia Scholastica (February 9, 1672 – 23 February 1672), Archduchess of Austria.

The Empress was intensely anti-Semitic, and inspired her husband to expel the Jews from Vienna, because she believed that they were to blame for her children’s deaths. During the Corpus Christi celebration of 1670, the Emperor ordered the destruction of the Vienna synagogue and a church was built on the site on his orders.

Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor

Even after her marriage, Margaret-Theresa kept her Spanish customs and ways. She did not speak German, and the arrogance of her native retinue led to a strong anti-Spanish sentiment among the imperial court. The courtiers openly expressed the hope that the weak Empress would soon die and thus give Leopold I the opportunity of a second marriage.

Death

During her last pregnancy Margaret-Theresa fell ill with bronchitis; this, along with her already weakened health due to four living childbirths and at least two miscarriages during her marriage, caused her early death on March 12, 1673, at the age of 21.

She was buried in the Imperial Crypt, in Vienna. Only four months later, the widower Emperor – despite his grief for the death of his “only Margareta” (as he remembered her) – entered into a second marriage with Archduchess Claudia-Felicitas of Austria, member of the Tyrol branch of the House of Habsburg.

After Margaret-Theresa’s death, her rights over the Spanish throne were inherited by her only surviving daughter Maria-Antonia, who in turn passed them to her only surviving son Prince Joseph-Ferdinand of Bavaria when she died in 1692.

After Joseph-Ferdinand’s early death in 1699, the rights of inheritance were disputed by both Emperor Leopold I and King Louis XIV of France, son-in-law of King Felipe IV, and grandson of King Felipe III. The outcome of the War of the Spanish Succession was the creation of the Spanish branch of the House of Bourbon in the person of King Felipe V, Margaret’s great-nephew.

Daughter

Archduchess Maria-Antonia of Austria

Archduchess Maria-Antonia of Austria (January 18, 1669 – December 24, 1692) the eldest daughter and only surviving child of Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I and his wife Infanta Margaret-Theresa of Spain. She was the heir to the Spanish throne after her maternal uncle Carlos II of Spain from 1673 until her death. Archduchess Maria-Antonia of Austria was an Electress of Bavaria by marriage to Maximilian II Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria.

On July 11, 2020, I featured Maria-Antonia of Austria’s husband, Maximilian II Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria, here on the blog.

https://europeanroyalhistory.wordpress.com/2020/07/11/july-11-1662-birth-of/

July 11, 1662: Birth of Maximilian II Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria

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Elector of Bavaria, Holy Roman Emperor, Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, House of Wittelsbach, King Carlos II of Spain, Maximilian II Emanuel of Bavaria, Prince Joseph Ferdinand of Bavaria, War of the Spanish Succession

Maximilian II Emanuel (July 11, 1662 – February 26, 1726), also known as Max Emanuel or Maximilian Emanuel, was a Wittelsbach ruler of Bavaria and a Prince-Elector of the Holy Roman Empire. He was also the last governor of the Spanish Netherlands and Duke of Luxembourg. An able soldier, his ambition led to conflicts that limited his ultimate dynastic achievements. By virtue of his electoral title, the Elector of Bavaria was a member of the Council of Electors in the Imperial Diet as well as Archsteward of the Holy Roman Empire.

Maximilian II Emanuel, Prince-Imperial Elector of Bavaria

He was born in Munich to Ferdinand-Maria, Elector of Bavaria and Princess Henriette-Adelaide of Savoy (d.1676). His maternal grandparents were Victor-Amadeus I of Savoy and Christine Marie of France, daughter of King Henri IV.

Maximilian II Emanuel inherited the elector’s mantle while still a minor in 1679 and remained under his uncle Maximilian-Philipp’s regency until 1680. By 1683 he was already embarked on a military career, fighting in the defence of Vienna against the attempt of the Ottoman Empire to extend their possessions further into Europe.

He returned to court for long enough to marry Archduchess Maria-Antonia of Austria, (Maria Antonia Josepha Benedicta Rosalia Petronella; January 18, 1669 – December 24, 1692) daughter of Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor and Infanta Margaret-Theresa of Spain. She was the heir to the Spanish throne after her maternal uncle Carlos II of Spain from 1673 until her death.

The birth of Archduchess Maria-Antonia of Austria was the result of the inbreeding chronic in the Habsburg family during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Her father Leopold was her mother’s maternal uncle and paternal first cousin once removed. Also, her maternal grandparents, King Felipe IV of Spain and Queen Mariana, were uncle and niece.

Archduchess Maria-Antonia of Austria

The marriage between Elector Maximilian II Emanuel and Archduchess Maria-Antonia of Austria occurred on July 15, 1685 in Vienna, Austria. This marriage was very unhappy since the couple disliked each other, but it was successful in producing the desired heir for both Bavaria and the Spanish monarchy. Maximilian II Emanuel’s fame was assured when, in 1688, he led the capture of Belgrade from the Turks, with the full support of Serbian insurgents under the command of Jovan Monasterlija.

In the War of the Grand Alliance he again fought on the Habsburgs’ side, protecting the Rhine frontier, and, being the Emperor’s son-in-law and the husband of the King of Spain’s niece, was appointed governor of the Spanish Netherlands in late 1691.

Maximilian II Emanuel, by virtue of his marriage to Archduchess Maria-Antonia, the sole child of Emperor Leopold I’d Spanish marriage, was one of the more serious claimants to the Spanish inheritance of Carlos II of Spain, and the birth of his son Joseph-Ferdinand in October 1692 immediately created a new pretender to the Spanish throne.

In October 1698, William III of England and Louis XIV of France concluded the First Partition Treaty, which gave the Spanish crown with the Indies to Joseph-Ferdinand, Milan to Emperor Joseph’s younger son Archduke Charles, and the rest of Spanish Italy to France.

Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor

The unexpected death of Joseph-Ferdinand four months later voided this plan and in the Second Partition Treaty, the Bavarian portion of the inheritance was allotted to Archduke Charles. By the outbreak of the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701, Maximilian II Emanuel, who had long-term imperial aspirations, had hoped that his governorship of the Spanish Netherlands might yet reap the reward of a share of the Spanish inheritance from either Leopold or, failing him, Louis XIV. Allying himself with the French against Austria, his campaign against Tyrol in 1703 did not have success and his plans were then frustrated by the disastrous defeat at the Battle of Blenheim in 1704.

Elector Maximilian II Emanuel was again forced to flee the Netherlands after the Battle of Ramillies on May 23, 1706 and found refuge at the French court in Versailles where his late sister Archduchess Maria-Anna (1660–1690) had been the wife of Prince Louis, the Grand Dauphin.

Back in Bavaria, Maximilian II Emanuel focused on architecture projects to balance the failure of his political ambitions. It was bitter for him to witness the royal elevation of the German princes Augustus II the Strong of Saxony became King of Poland (1697), Elector Friedrich III of Brandenburg became King Friedrich I in Prussia (1701) and Elector Georg-Ludwig of Hanover became King George I of Great Britain and Ireland 1714) as well as of his cousin Victor-Amadeus II of Savoy became the King of Sardinia (1713) while his own political dreams could not be realized.

Maximilian II Emanuel supported the new wars of the Habsburg against the Turks with Bavarian auxiliary forces (1717). In 1724 he created a union of all lines of the Wittelsbach dynasty to increase the influence of his house. The Wittelsbach Prince-Elector Maximilian II Emanuel, his son Clemens-August of Cologne, Charles III Philipp, Elector Palatine of the Rhine and Franz-Ludwig of Trier had at that time four votes at their disposal for the next imperial election.

Theresa Kunegunda Sobieska of Poland

Maximilian II Emanuel second marriage was to Theresa Kunegunda (Polish: Teresa Kunegunda Sobieska, German: Kurfürstin Therese Kunigunde) (March 4, 1676 – March 10, 1730) was a Polish princess, She also served as Regent of the Palatinate in 1704–05.

She was a daughter of John III Sobieski King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania and Marie Casimire Louise de La Grange d’Arquien. Theresa was baptized in Jaworow on July 19, 1676, having for godfather Charles II, king of England and for godmother Marie-Thérèse of Austria, wife of Louis XIV.

The crown of the Holy Roman Empire was sought for either Maximilian II Emanuel or his son Charles-Albert. Already in 1722 Charles-Albert had been married to the Habsburg princess Archduchess Maria-Amalia of Austria. Charles-Albert was elected Holy Roman Emperor as Charles VII (1697-1745) in 1742. A member of the House of Wittelsbach, as the son of Maximilian II Emanuel, Charles VII’s reign marked the end of three centuries of uninterrupted Habsburg imperial rule.

Charles VII Albert, Holy Roman Emperor

Charles VII was, however, related to the Habsburgs both by blood and by marriage. After the death of emperor Charles VI in 1740 he claimed the Archduchy of Austria due to his marriage to Archduchess Maria-Amalia of Austria, the niece of Charles VI, and was from 1741 to 1743 as Charles III briefly King of Bohemia.

In 1726, Maximilian II Emanuel died of a stroke. He is buried in the crypt of the Theatinerkirche in Munich.

Carlos II and the War of the Spanish Succession

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Carlos I of Spain, Carlos II of Spain, Duke of Anjou, Ferdinand III, Ferdinand of Spain, Holy Roman Emperor, Inbreeding, Isabella of Spain, Joanna of Castile, Kingdom of Aragon, Kingdom of Catile, Kingdom of France, Kingdom of Spain, Louis XIII of France, Louis XIV of France, Philip of Austria, War of the Spanish Succession

HM King Felipe V of Spain 

Last week I examined the lineage of King Carlos II of Spain (1665-1700). Because of his inbreeding he had many physical and metal difficulties and despite two marriages he never fathered and heir leaving the succession to the Spanish throne contested by the major European powers. In this post I will examine the genealogical aspect to the War of the Spanish Succession and I won’t delve too deeply into the political aspect except only when it is necessary.

In 1700 when Carlos II died Spain was still a major European power so the vacancy to the throne left two rival dynasties, the French royal house of Bourbon and the Austrian house of Habsburg, eager to claim the prize of the crown of Spain. One branch of the Habsburg family had ruled Spain since Philipp the Fair (Felipe I) mounted the throne of Castile in 1506. The French house of Bourbon claimed the throne from their descent from Felipe III of Spain (1578-1621). King Louis XIV of France and Navarre had a strong claim to the Spanish crown being a grandson of Felipe III. However, with the rules of male preferred primogeniture, Louis XIV’s son, Louis, the Grand Dauphin (1661-1711) actually had the better claim being the nephew of King Carlos II via his eldest sister, Maria Theresa, wife of Louis XIV. Since the Grand Dauphin was also heir to the throne of France he would have united the crowns of France and Spain creating an enormously powerful empire which would have dominated Europe. To the other powers of Europe this was not acceptable.

The Habsburg heir to the Spanish throne was Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I (1658-1705) who was the grandson of Felipe III of Spain via his younger daughter, Maria Anna of Spain, who was also the second wife of King Felipe IV of Spain. Leopold was married to his cousin Margaret Theresa of Spain (1651-1673) sister to King Carlos II. If Leopold I had become king of Spain this would have reunited the great Empire held by Holy Roman Emperor Karl V who was also King Carlos I of Spain (1516-1558). This too was unacceptable to the European powers. Even though Carlos II and Leopold I were both from the Hapsburg dynasty the French Bourbons, Louis the Grand Dauphin specifically, held the better claim in that both Louis XIV and his son were descended via older daughters of the Spanish kings than were their Hapsburg rivals. Since both Louis the Grand Dauphin and Leopold I were unacceptable a compromise had to be found.

Both Leopold and Louis XIV were willing to pass their claims to others in their respective dynasties. Louis desired his grandson, Philippe Duc d’Anjou (1683-1746, second son of the Grand Dauphin to succeed to the crown of Spain. The Duc d’Anjou was even favored by Carlos II (the struggle to solve this problem occurred prior to the kings death). Leopold desired that the Spanish crown would go to his younger son, Archduke Karl of Austria. Even those these options reduced the likelihood that the Spanish crown would be united to either France or the Holy Roman Empire neither were acceptable to the other European powers specifically King William III of England and Scotland, Stadholder of the Netherlands.

A candidate was finally found which all parties could agree on. He was not a member of either the Hapsburg or Bourbon dynasty, he was a member of the German Wittelsbach family of Bavaria. Joseph Ferdinand of Bavaria, (1692-1699) was the son of Maximilian II Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria (1679-1726) and his first wife, Maria Antonia of Austria. Joseph Ferdinand’s mother, Maria Antonia of Austria, was the daughter of Leopold I and a maternal granddaughter of King Felipe IV of Spain. Carlos II formally recognized Joseph Ferdinand as his heir and Joseph was given the title Prince of Asturias, the title typically held by the heir to the Spanish crown. This matter of the Spanish crown was not settled for long. On February 3, 1699 the young Prince of Asturias died at the age of seven. There were rumors that he had been poisoned.

This left the major powers all scrambling once again. Treaties were made up signed and ignored. At one point the succession was agreed to go to Archduke Karl as long as Spain’s Italian possessions were not included. The Austrians were not happy with this option. In Spain feelings were mixed as to who their next king should be but they did not want their Spanish possessions in Italy to be divided. However, many statesmen within Spain favored the Duc d’Anjou. Carlos II made a Will bequeathing the crown to the Duc d’Anjou and stipulated that should the Duc d’Anjou inherit the French throne the succession would pass to his brother, Charles Duc de Berri. After the Duc de Berri the Archduke Karl was in line for the succession.

When Carlos II died in 1700 the Duc d’Anjou was proclaimed King of Spain as Felipe V (1700-1746). In violation of one of the treaties all of the Spanish territories in Italy went to Felipe. Despite agreements with England, France placed pressure on England by cutting them off from Spanish trade. With the death of the exiled King James II-VII of England and Scotland in France, Louis recognized his son, James, as the rightful King James III-VIII of England and Scotland. This greatly angered William III. The Austrians were also angered by the inclusion of the Italian territories in the Spanish succession and within the year sent troops into Milan headed by Prince Eugene of Savoy.

War broke out in 1701 and was to last until 1714. Leopold I died in 1705 and was succeeded as Emperor by his eldest son Josef I (1705-1711). In 1711 when Josef I died his brother, Archduke Karl, Austrian claimant to the Spanish throne, succeed as Holy Roman Emperor Karl VI. With the possibility of Karl become King of Spain this created the same problem, of uniting the two Empires, that had been so unacceptable to the majority of the European powers in the first place. England found themselves in a precarious position in that their  ally, Karl VI, was in a position they thoroughly opposed.  Because of this change of circumstances the war was ended. In signing the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 Felipe V was recognized as King of Spain and renounced his place in the succession for the french Crown for himself and his descendant. This renunciation has ripple effects through today as the heir of the Spanish descendants of Felipe V, Louis Alphonse, Duc d’Anjou, claims the vacant French throne on the grounds that the Treaty of Utrecht violated French laws governing the succession.

https://europeanroyalhistory.wordpress.com/2012/05/24/pretenders-to-the-throne-france-part-i/

https://europeanroyalhistory.wordpress.com/2012/05/25/pretenders-to-the-throne-france-part-ii/

The lineage of Carlos II of Spain

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Carlos I of Spain, Carlos II of Spain, Duke of Anjou, Ferdinand III, Ferdinand of Spain, Holy Roman Emperor, Inbreeding, Isabella of Spain, Joanna of Castile, Kingdom of Aragon, Kingdom of Catile, Kingdom of France, Kingdom of Spain, Louis XIII of France, Louis XIV of France, Philip of Austria, War of the Spanish Succession

HM King Carlos II of Spain 

Today I want to look at the genealogy of King Carlos II of Spain (1661-1700). If any royal person is a victim of too many dips into the gene pool it is him. Going back only a few generations, to his 8 great-grandparents we see 6 of them are all from the Habsburg dynasty and the final 2 are from the Bavarian Wittelsbach dynasty. If we go back one generation further it gets much worse.

The Spanish kingdoms of Castile and Aragon married into each other’s dynasties for generations. King Fernando II of Aragon (Fernando V of Castile) (1452-1516) was a first cousin to his wife Queen Isabelle I of Castile (1451-1504) and these two monarchs that united Spain were both the results of inter-cousin marriages of their forbears. When Fernando and Isabelle’s daughter, Joanna (1479-1555) married the Habsburg heir, Philipp (Felipe) (1478-1506), you would think bringing in new blood would have helped the Spanish line, while it did in the short term it was a problem in the long term. Every single one of his 64 great-great-great-great-great grandparents is a descendant of, or connect to, the marriage of Joanna of Spain and Philipp of Austria.

In 1516 Karl of Austria inherited Spain upon the death of his maternal grandfather King Fernando V-II of Castile-Aragon as King Carlos I of Spain (1500-1558) and in 1519 he succeeded his paternal grandfather Emperor Maximilian I as Holy Roman Emperor Karl V, making him one of the most powerful emperors since the time of Charlemagne. Technically, Karl was co-monarch of Spain along with his mother, who by that time had slipped into insanity after the death of her husband. Karl married his maternal first cousin Infanta Isabella of Portugal (1503-1539). In 1556 Karl abdicated all of his thrones and the Spanish and Italian crowns went to his eldest son Felipe II of Spain (1527-1598) and the Holy Roman Empire and Austrian titles went to his brother Ferdinand (1503-1564).

This seemed to have created a new problem genealogically speaking. For the next several generations the Spanish and Austrian branches of the Habsburg family intermarried with one another at what we today would find rather disturbing rate. For example, King Felipe III of Spain (1578-1621) was the son of King Felipe II of Spain and his 4th wife who was also his niece, Archduchess Anne of Austria (1549-1580). Now Anne of Austria’s mother, Marie of Spain (1528-1603) was the sister of King Felipe II of Spain, and was a first cousin to her husband, Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II (1527-1576). Maximilian II himself was the product of an intermarriage also. His father, Emperor Ferdinand I, was a younger brother of Holy Roman Emperor Karl V, King of Spain, as we have seen, but Ferdinand married a cousin from the Hungarian branch of the Habsburg family.

Felipe III of Spain continued the practice of marrying into the Austrian branch of the Habsburg family. He married princess Margaret of Austria (1584-1611) who was the product of a uncle-niece union. Margaret’s mother, Marie of Bavaria (1551-1608) was the daughter of Duke Albrecht V of Bavaria (1528-1579) and Archduchess Anne of Austria (sister to Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II). Marie of Bavaria’s husband was her uncle Archduke Karl II of Austria, Duke of Styria (1540-1590). Is your head spinning yet? Marie and Karl had 15 children but we will be concerned only with three: Margaret (1584-1611), the wife of Felipe III of Spain, Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II (1578-1637) and Archduke Leopold of Austria, Duke of Tyrol (1586-1632).

Felipe III and Archduchess Margaret had eight children, of whom five survived into adulthood. Only three concern us here. Anne of Austria (1601-1666), Felipe IV of Spain (1605-1665) and Marie Anne of Austria (1606-1646). Anne married King Louis XIII of France and Navarre (1601-1643) and were the parents of King Louis XIV of France and Navarre (1638-1715) and it was from this union stems the Bourbon claim to the Spanish throne. Felipe IV married twice. His first wife was Elisabeth de Bourbon-France (1602-1644) sister to King Louis XIII. Their daughter, Infanta Marie Therese of Spain (1638-1683) married her first cousin Louis XIV of France, strengthening the French royal house’s claim to the Spanish throne.

Felipe IV’s first wife, Elisabeth died in 1644, and their son, Infante Balthasar Carlos, died in 1646 leaving Felipe without an heir. He chose as his second wife his niece (but of course!), Archduchess Mariana of Austria (1634-1696), the daughter of Felipe IV’s sister Infanta Marie Anne of Spain and her first cousin, Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III (1608-1657). Felipe IV and Archduchess Marie Anne of Austria had two children that concern us here: Margaret Theresa and Carlos. Before I mention Carlos I will mention his sister, Infanta Margaret Theresa. Infanta Margaret Theresa married her cousin, Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I (1640-1705), who was the son of Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III and his second wife, Archduchess Marie of Austria, who was his niece being the product of the union of her father’s brother, Archduke Leopold of Austria, Duke of Tyrol and Claudia de Medici (wow, new blood!). From this union would stem the claims to the Spanish throne of both the Bavarian and Habsburg dynasties.

Carlos II of Spain suffered from this inbreeding. He was born physically and mentally disabled, and disfigured. He suffered from mandibular prognathism and he was was unable to chew. His tongue was so large that it was difficult for him to speak and to be understood. It was reported that he drooled. Medical historians suggest that he suffered from an endocrine disease acromegaly, and that his lineage may have contributed to rare genetic disorders such as combined pituitary hormone deficiency and distal renal tubular acidosis. He married twice. His first wife was his French cousin, Marie Louise of Orléans (1662–1689). His second wife was Maria Anna of Neuburg (1667-1740) a member of the Bavarian Wittelsbach dynasty. He left no heir and it is more than likely Carlos was impotent or sterile.

His death left a vacancy for the Spanish throne. He left the throne to his great-nephew, Prince Philippe de Bourbon, Duc D’Anjou who became King Felipe V of Spain. However there were other claimants to the Spanish throne and the death of King Carlos II lead to the War of the Spanish Succession which I will recount in next Monday’s look at royal genealogy.