, title = Princess Radziwiłł , image = Archduchess Renata.jpg , caption = , reign = , coronation = , predecessor = , successor = , succession = , spouse = , issue = Dominik Rainer Radziwiłł , house =

Habsburg-Lorraine The House of Habsburg-Lorraine (german: Haus Habsburg-Lothringen) originated from the marriage in 1736 of Francis III, Duke of Lorraine and Bar, and Maria Theresa of Austria, later successively Queen of Bohemia, Queen of Hungary, Queen of ...

(by birth)
Radziwiłł (by marriage) , father = Archduke Charles Stephen of Austria , mother = Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria, Princess of Tuscany , birth_date = , birth_place = Pula,

Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary, often referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire,, the Dual Monarchy, or Austria, was a constitutional monarchy and great power in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. It was formed with the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of ...

, death_date = , death_place = Balice,

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

, burial_place = Archduchess Renate of Austria (2 January 1888 – 9 December 1935) was a daughter of Archduke Charles Stephen of Austria and a first cousin of King Alphonso XIII of Spain. A member of the Teschen branch of the

House of Habsburg-Lorraine The House of Habsburg-Lorraine (german: Haus Habsburg-Lothringen) originated from the marriage in 1736 of Francis III, Duke of Lorraine and Bar, and Maria Theresa of Austria, later successively Queen of Bohemia, Queen of Hungary, Queen of C ...

and an Archduchess of

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

and Princess of Bohemia,

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the ...

, and

Tuscany it, Toscano (man) it, Toscana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Citizenship , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = Italian , demogra ...

by birth, she renounced her titles in 1909 upon her marriage to Prince Jerome Radziwiłł.

Early life

Archduchess Renate was the second daughter of Archduke Charles Stephen of Austria and his wife, Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria, Princess of Tuscany. Both of her parents were closely related to Emperor

Franz Joseph Franz Joseph I or Francis Joseph I (german: Franz Joseph Karl, hu, Ferenc József Károly, 18 August 1830 – 21 November 1916) was Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, and the other states of the Habsburg monarchy from 2 December 1848 until his ...

. Renata’s father was a grandson of Archduke Charles of Austria who had led the Austrian army against

Napoleon Bonaparte Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader wh ...

. Her father was also a brother of Queen Maria Christina of Spain. Renate’s mother, Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria, Princess of Tuscany was a granddaughter of Leopold II, the last reigning Grand Duke of Tuscany, and of King

Ferdinand II of the Two Sicilies Ferdinand II ( it, Ferdinando Carlo; scn, Ferdinannu Carlu; nap, Ferdinando Carlo; 12 January 1810 – 22 May 1859) was King of the Two Sicilies from 1830 until his death in 1859. Family Ferdinand was born in Palermo to King Francis I of the T ...

. Archduchess Renate was educated by private tutors with a special emphasis on languages. She learned German, Italian, English, French and, from 1895, Polish. Her father had followed a career in the Austrian Navy and Renate spent her formative years primarily in Istria in the then Austrian port of Pula on the Adriatic. Her father was very wealthy and the family had a winter residence in the island of Losinj in the Adriatic, a palace in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

and in 1895 her father inherited from Archduke Albert vast properties in Galicia. From 1907 the family’s main residence was in Saybusch Castle in western Galicia.McIntosh David, ''The Unknown Habsburgs'', Rovall Royal Books, 2000.

Personal life

Archduke Charles Stephen put aside his career in the navy and centered his ambitions in creating a Polish branch of the House of Habsburg. He encouraged all of his children to become Polish and Archduchess Renata ended up marrying one of Poland's richest

landowners In common law systems, land tenure, from the French verb "tenir" means "to hold", is the legal regime in which land owned by an individual is possessed by someone else who is said to "hold" the land, based on an agreement between both individual ...

, Prince Jerome Radziwill. Their engagement was announced in September 1908. The

Radziwiłł family The House of Radziwiłł (; lt, Radvila; be, Радзівіл, Radzivił; german: link=no, Radziwill) is a powerful magnate family originating from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and later also prominent in the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland. ...

was one of the most distinguish families of Poland, but since his family did not belong to a list of ruling or former ruling princely families, Renata had to renounce all of her titles, along with the style of ''

Imperial and Royal Highness Imperial and Royal Highness (abbreviation HI&RH) is a style possessed by someone who either through birth or marriage holds two individual styles, '' Imperial Highness'' and '' Royal Highness''. ''His/Her Imperial Highness'' is a style used by me ...

''. They signed a prenuptial agreement and separation of property. The wedding took place on 15 January 1909 in the chapel at Saybusch Castle. Archduchess Renate and Prince Jerome Radziwiłł had six children and lived at Balice Castle, one of the Radziwiłł estates: * Princess Maria Teresa Radziwiłł (1910–1973), who died unmarried. * Prince Dominic Rainer Radziwiłł (1911–1976), who married

Princess Eugénie of Greece and Denmark Princess Eugénie of Greece and Denmark ( el, Ευγενία; 10 February 1910 – 13 February 1989) was the youngest child and only daughter of Prince George of Greece and Denmark and his wife, Princess Marie Bonaparte, daughter of Marie-Féli ...

in 1938. They divorced in 1946 and he married Lidia Lacey Bloodgood, a daughter of John Van Schaick Bloodgood and Lida Fleitmann Bloodgood. * Prince Karol Jerome Radziwiłł (1912–2005), who married Maria Luisa de Alvear y Quirno in 1949 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, later, Maria Teresa Soto y Alderete. * Prince Albert Radziwiłł (1914–1932), who died young at Davos, Switzerland. * Princess Eleonore Radziwiłł (b. 1918), who married Count Benedikt

Tyszkiewicz Tyszkiewicz is the name of the Tyszkiewicz family, a Polish–Lithuanian magnate noble family of Ruthenian origin. The Lithuanian equivalent is Tiškevičius; it is frequently transliterated from Russian and Belarusian as Tyshkevich. Other peopl ...

in 1938. She married Roger de Froidcourt in 1959. * Prince Leon Jerome Radziwiłł (1922–1973). Her eldest son, Dominik, eventually married

in 1938. With the defeat and

dissolution of Austria-Hungary The dissolution of Austria-Hungary was a major geopolitical event that occurred as a result of the growth of internal social contradictions and the separation of different parts of Austria-Hungary. The reason for the collapse of the state was Worl ...

after

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, the destiny of her family was even more closely linked to Poland. Archduchess Renata lived at Balice Castle in

, where she died on 16 May 1935. Her husband outlived her for ten years. Prince Jerome remarried. Towards the end of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, Prince Jerome was captured by Soviet troops and he was taken behind the Iron Curtain. He died in a concentration camp in 1945. The Radziwiłł properties were all lost. Snyder, Timothy, ''The Red Prince: The Secret Lives of A Habsburg Archduke'' . Basic Books, 2008.

Ancestry

References

;Notes ;Sources {{DEFAULTSORT:Renate Of Austria, Archduchess 1888 births 1935 deaths House of Habsburg-Lorraine Austrian princesses People of World War I from Austria-Hungary People from Pula