Maria Leopoldine of Austria-Tyrol (6 April 1632 – 7 August 1649), was by birth

Archduchess of Austria The Archduchy of Austria (german: Erzherzogtum Österreich) was a major principality of the Holy Roman Empire and the nucleus of the Habsburg monarchy. With its capital at Vienna, the archduchy was centered at the Empire's southeastern periph ...

and member of the Tyrolese branch of the

House of Habsburg The House of Habsburg (), alternatively spelled Hapsburg in Englishgerman: Haus Habsburg, ; es, Casa de Habsburgo; hu, Habsburg család, it, Casa di Asburgo, nl, Huis van Habsburg, pl, dom Habsburgów, pt, Casa de Habsburgo, la, Domus Hab ...

and by marriage the second spouse of her first cousin,

Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III Ferdinand III (Ferdinand Ernest; 13 July 1608, in Graz – 2 April 1657, in Vienna) was from 1621 Archduke of Austria, King of Hungary from 1625, King of Croatia and Bohemia from 1627 and Holy Roman Emperor from 1637 until his death in 1657. Fe ...

. As such, she was

Empress of the Holy Roman Empire The Holy Roman Empress or Empress of the Holy Roman Empire (''Kaiserin des Heiligen Römischen Reiches'') was the wife or widow of the Holy Roman Emperor. The elective dignity of Holy Roman emperor was restricted to males only, but some empress ...

, German Queen and Queen consort of Hungary and Bohemia. She died in childbirth.

Life

Early years

Maria Leopoldine was born in InnsbruckWurzbach 1861, p. 52. on 6 April 1632 as the third (but second surviving) daughter and the fifth and youngest child of Leopold V, Archduke of Further Austria, and

Claudia de' Medici Claudia de' Medici (4 June 1604 – 25 December 1648) was Regent of the Austrian County of Tyrol during the minority of her son from 1632 until 1646. She was a daughter of Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany and Christina of Lorraine. ...

. Her father died on 13 September 1632, when she was five months old. On her father's side, her grandparents were Charles II, Archduke of Inner Austria and his wife and niece Princess Maria Anna of Bavaria and on her mother's side her grandparents were

Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (30 July 1549 – 3 February 1609) was Grand Duke of Tuscany from 1587 to 1609, having succeeded his older brother Francesco I. Early life Ferdinando was the fifth son (the third surviving at ...

and his wife Princess

Christina of Lorraine Christina of Lorraine or Christine de Lorraine (16 August 1565 – 19 December 1637) was a member of the House of Lorraine and was the Grand Duchess of Tuscany by marriage. She served as Regent of Tuscany jointly with her daughter-in-law during ...

. In addition to her full-siblings, she had an older half-sister, Vittoria della Rovere, born from her mother's first marriage with

Federico Ubaldo della Rovere, Duke of Urbino Federico Ubaldo della Rovere (16 May 1605 – 28 June 1623) was Duke of Urbino and the father of Vittoria della Rovere. Biography The eldest son and heir of Francesco Maria II, Duke of Urbino. His parents were cousins. Francesco Maria II ...

. Maria Leopoldine's oldest brother, Ferdinand Charles, inherited

Further Austria Further Austria, Outer Austria or Anterior Austria (german: Vorderösterreich, formerly ''die Vorlande'' (pl.)) was the collective name for the early (and later) possessions of the House of Habsburg in the former Swabian stem duchy of south-wes ...

, but Dowager Archduchess Claudia assumed

regency A regent (from Latin : ruling, governing) is a person appointed to govern a state '' pro tempore'' (Latin: 'for the time being') because the monarch is a minor, absent, incapacitated or unable to discharge the powers and duties of the monarchy ...

because of her son's minority. In a letter written to his mother,

Elizabeth of England Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was List of English monarchs, Queen of England and List of Irish monarchs, Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is ...

, on 8 September 1641, Charles Louis of the Palatinate (later Elector Palatine) described the intentions of his uncle,

King Charles I of England Charles I (19 November 1600 – 30 January 1649) was King of England, Scotland, and Ireland from 27 March 1625 until Execution of Charles I, his execution in 1649. He was born into the House of Stuart as the second son of King James VI of ...

, and Maria Leopoldine's first cousin,

, to arrange a marriage between the 9-years-old Archduchess and himself; the marriage between them was to end "all grudges betweene our families". However, the union never took place.

Marriage and death

Linz Linz ( , ; cs, Linec) is the capital of Upper Austria and third-largest city in Austria. In the north of the country, it is on the Danube south of the Czech border. In 2018, the population was 204,846. In 2009, it was a European Capital ...

on 2 July 1648 Maria Leopoldine married the widowed Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III, thereby becoming

, Queen of the Germans,

Queen of Hungary The King of Hungary ( hu, magyar király) was the ruling head of state of the Kingdom of Hungary from 1000 (or 1001) to 1918. The style of title "Apostolic King of Hungary" (''Apostoli Magyar Király'') was endorsed by Pope Clement XIII in 1 ...

and

Queen of Bohemia This is a list of the royal consorts of the rulers of Bohemia. The first Duchess of Bohemia (''česká kněžna'') was St. Ludmila, while the first Queen of Bohemia (''česká královna'') was Świętosława of Poland. Some of them were (like ...

. The wedding ceremony was splendid; The composer Andreas Rauch celebrated the marriage as "anticipating (with the help of Divine Providence) the most beautiful end of the

Thirty Years' War The Thirty Years' War was one of the longest and most destructive conflicts in European history, lasting from 1618 to 1648. Fought primarily in Central Europe, an estimated 4.5 to 8 million soldiers and civilians died as a result of battle ...

" and an opera titled ''I Trifoni d'Amore'', produced by

Giovanni Felice Sances Giovanni Felice Sances (also Sancies, Sanci, Sanes, Sanchez, ca. 160024 November 1679) was an Italian singer and a Baroque composer. He was renowned in Europe during his time. Sances studied at the Collegio Germanico in Rome from 1609 to 1614. ...

, was meant to commemorate the event, but the Prague premiere was canceled at the last moment when King Vladislaus IV of Poland (Ferdinand III's brother-in-law) died within two months of the wedding; the planned Pressburg performance apparently never took place. The new Empress was as closely related to her husband as her cousin and predecessor,

Maria Anna of Spain , house = Habsburg , father = Philip III of Spain , mother = Margaret of Austria , birth_date = , birth_place = El Escorial, Spain , death_date = , death_place = Linz, Austria , burial_place = Imperial Crypt , ...

; both marriages were means by which the

, from time to time, reinforced itself. Soon after her wedding, Maria Leopoldine became pregnant, and was depicted as such in the 1649 painting by the Italian painter and poet

Lorenzo Lippi Lorenzo Lippi (3 May 1606 – 15 April 1665) was an Italian painter and poet. Biography Born in Florence, he studied painting under Matteo Rosselli. Both Baldassare Franceschini and Francesco Furini were also apprenticed with Rosselli, the ...

. The Imperial couple's only child,

Archduke Charles Joseph of Austria Charles Joseph (german: Karl Joseph) (7 August 1649 – 27 January 1664) was an Archduke of Austria and Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights (1662–64). He was also the bishop of Olmütz, and Breslau, Passau. Charles Joseph was born in V ...

, was born on 7 August 1649. The childbirth was extremely difficult, ending in the death of the 17-year-old Empress. Her husband remarried within two years, while their son died childless aged 14.Martin Mutschlechner: Ferdinand III - Ehen und Nachkommen in: habsburger.net
etrieved 3 November 2016 She is buried in tomb 21 in the Imperial Crypt 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 ...

. The writer Wolf Helmhardt, Baron von Hohberg, then at the beginning of his career, sent to Emperor Ferdinand III a poem written in honour of the late Empress, called "Poem of tears" (de: ''Klag-Gedicht'').

Life

Early years

Marriage and death

Ancestry

References

Further reading

Royal titles