Maria Sofia of Bavaria
Encyclopedia
Maria Sophie of Bavaria, (4 October 1841, Possenhofen Castle
– 19 January 1925, Munich
) was the last Queen consort
of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies
. She was one of the ten children of Maximilian Joseph, Duke in Bavaria
and Princess Ludovika of Bavaria. She was born as Duchess Maria Sophia in Bavaria. She was the younger sister of the better-known Elisabeth of Bavaria
("Sisi") who married Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria.
, King of Naples. Within the year, with the death of the king, her husband ascended to the throne as Francis II of the Two Sicilies
, and Maria Sophie became queen of a realm that was shortly to be overwhelmed by the forces of Giuseppe Garibaldi
and Piedmontese army
.
In September 1860, as the Garibaldine troops were moving towards Naples
, his capital, Francis II decided to leave the city. At the beginning, he planned to organise a resistance in Capua. However, after that city had also been lost to the Garibaldines in the aftermath of the battle of the Volturnus (October), he and Marie Sophie took refuge in the strong coastal fortress of Gaeta
, 80 km north of Naples.
During the Siege of Gaeta
in late 1860 and early 1861, the forces of Victor Emmanuel II
bombarded
and eventually overcame the defenders. It was this brief "last stand of the Bourbons" that gained Maria Sophia the reputation of the strong "warrior queen" that stayed with her for the rest of her life. She was tireless in her efforts to rally the defenders, giving them her own food, caring for the wounded, and daring the attackers to come within range of the fortress cannon.
, the capital of what for 1,000 years had been the sizeable Papal States
, a large piece of central Italy but which, by 1860, had been reduced to the city of Rome, itself, as the armies of Victor Emanuel II came down from the north to join up with Garibaldi, the conqueror of the south. King Francis set up a government in exile in Rome that enjoyed diplomatic recognition by most European states for a few years as still the legitimate government of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.
Her wealth and privilege were, to a certain extent, overshadowed by personal tragedies. Her marriage was not consummated for many years, as her husband suffered from phimosis
. His shyness and religious fanaticism also prevented the couple from developing any kind of physical intimacy with each other. While in exile in Rome, Maria fell in love with an officer of the papal guard, Armand de Lawayss, and became pregnant by him. She retreated to her parents' home at Possenhofen, where a family council decided that she must give birth in secret to prevent scandal. On 24 November 1862, Maria Sophie gave birth to a daughter in St. Ursula's Convent in Augsburg
. The child was immediately given to Lawayss' family. Maria Sophia was made to promise that she would never see him again, which deeply affected her. Maria Sophie suffered from depression in later life, which is believed to have been rooted in this event.
A year later, on the advice of her family, Maria Sophia decided to confess the affair to her husband. Afterwards, the relationship between the two improved for a time. Francis submitted to an operation which allowed him to consummate the marriage, and Maria became pregnant a second time, this time by her husband. Both were overjoyed at the turn of events and full of hope. On 24 December 1869, after ten years of marriage, Marie Sophie gave birth to a daughter, Maria Cristina Pia
. Cristina was born on the birthday of her aunt, Empress Elisabeth, who became her godmother. Unfortunately, the baby lived only three months and died on 28 March 1870. Maria Sophie and her husband never had another child.
, and then moved to Paris
where she presided over somewhat of an informal Bourbon court-in-exile. It was rumored she was involved in the anarchist
assassination
of King Humbert
in 1900 in hopes of destabilizing the new nation-state of Italy. Recent historians have resurrected that rumor based on the apparent credence given to this conspiracy theory
by the then Prime Minister of Italy, Giovanni Giolitti
. Others regard it as anecdotal. In any event, the case against Maria Sophia is circumstantial.
During World War I
, Maria Sophie was actively on the side of the German Empire
and Austria-Hungary
in their war with the Kingdom of Italy
. Again, the rumors claimed she was involved in sabotage and espionage against Italy in the hope that an Italian defeat would tear the nation apart and that the kingdom of Naples would be restored.
During her life, she generated an almost cult-like air of admiration even among her political enemies. Gabriele D'Annunzio
called her the "stern little Bavarian eagle" and Marcel Proust
spoke of the "soldier queen on the ramparts of Gaeta."
Maria Sophie died in Munich in 1925. From 1984 her remains now rest with those of her husband and their daughter in the Church of Santa Chiara in Naples
.
Possenhofen Castle
Possenhofen Castle is located in the town of Possenhofen on the western shore of Lake Starnberg in Bavaria, Germany.-History:The castle was built in 1536 by Jakob Rosenbusch, was destroyed during the Thirty Years' War, then rebuilt...
– 19 January 1925, Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
) was the last Queen consort
Queen consort
A queen consort is the wife of a reigning king. A queen consort usually shares her husband's rank and holds the feminine equivalent of the king's monarchical titles. Historically, queens consort do not share the king regnant's political and military powers. Most queens in history were queens consort...
of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies
Kingdom of the Two Sicilies
The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, commonly known as the Two Sicilies even before formally coming into being, was the largest and wealthiest of the Italian states before Italian unification...
. She was one of the ten children of Maximilian Joseph, Duke in Bavaria
Maximilian Joseph, Duke in Bavaria
Duke Maximilian Joseph in Bavaria , known informally as Max in Bayern, was a member of a junior branch of the House of Wittelsbach and a promoter of Bavarian folk-music...
and Princess Ludovika of Bavaria. She was born as Duchess Maria Sophia in Bavaria. She was the younger sister of the better-known Elisabeth of Bavaria
Elisabeth of Bavaria
Elisabeth of Austria was the spouse of Franz Joseph I, and therefore both Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary. She also held the titles of Queen of Bohemia and Croatia, among others...
("Sisi") who married Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria.
Queen
On 3 February 1859 Maria Sophie married the Duke of Calabria, the eldest son of Ferdinand II of the Two SiciliesFerdinand II of the Two Sicilies
Ferdinand II was King of the Two Sicilies from 1830 until his death.-Family:Ferdinand was born in Palermo, the son of King Francis I of the Two Sicilies and his wife and first cousin Maria Isabella of Spain.His paternal grandparents were King Ferdinand I of the Two Sicilies and Queen Marie...
, King of Naples. Within the year, with the death of the king, her husband ascended to the throne as Francis II of the Two Sicilies
Francis II of the Two Sicilies
Francis II , was King of the Two Sicilies from 1859 to 1861. He was the last King of the Two Sicilies, as successive invasions by Giuseppe Garibaldi and Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia ultimately brought an end to his rule, and marked the first major event of Italian unification...
, and Maria Sophie became queen of a realm that was shortly to be overwhelmed by the forces of Giuseppe Garibaldi
Giuseppe Garibaldi
Giuseppe Garibaldi was an Italian military and political figure. In his twenties, he joined the Carbonari Italian patriot revolutionaries, and fled Italy after a failed insurrection. Garibaldi took part in the War of the Farrapos and the Uruguayan Civil War leading the Italian Legion, and...
and Piedmontese army
Italian unification
Italian unification was the political and social movement that agglomerated different states of the Italian peninsula into the single state of Italy in the 19th century...
.
In September 1860, as the Garibaldine troops were moving towards Naples
Naples
Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...
, his capital, Francis II decided to leave the city. At the beginning, he planned to organise a resistance in Capua. However, after that city had also been lost to the Garibaldines in the aftermath of the battle of the Volturnus (October), he and Marie Sophie took refuge in the strong coastal fortress of Gaeta
Gaeta
Gaeta is a city and comune in the province of Latina, in Lazio, central Italy. Set on a promontory stretching towards the Gulf of Gaeta, it is 120 km from Rome and 80 km from Naples....
, 80 km north of Naples.
During the Siege of Gaeta
Siege of Gaeta (1860)
The Siege of Gaeta was the concluding event of the war between the Kingdom of Sardinia and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. It started on November 5, 1860 and ended February 13, 1861, and took place in Gaeta, in today's Southern Lazio .-Background:...
in late 1860 and early 1861, the forces of Victor Emmanuel II
Victor Emmanuel II of Italy
Victor Emanuel II was king of Sardinia from 1849 and, on 17 March 1861, he assumed the title King of Italy to become the first king of a united Italy since the 6th century, a title he held until his death in 1878...
bombarded
Bombardment
A bombardment is an attack by artillery fire directed against fortifications, troops or towns and buildings.Prior to World War I the term term was only applied to the bombardment of defenceless or undefended objects, houses, public buildings, it was only loosely employed to describe artillery...
and eventually overcame the defenders. It was this brief "last stand of the Bourbons" that gained Maria Sophia the reputation of the strong "warrior queen" that stayed with her for the rest of her life. She was tireless in her efforts to rally the defenders, giving them her own food, caring for the wounded, and daring the attackers to come within range of the fortress cannon.
Rome
With the fall of Gaeta and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Maria Sophia and her husband went into exile in RomeRome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
, the capital of what for 1,000 years had been the sizeable Papal States
Papal States
The Papal State, State of the Church, or Pontifical States were among the major historical states of Italy from roughly the 6th century until the Italian peninsula was unified in 1861 by the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia .The Papal States comprised territories under...
, a large piece of central Italy but which, by 1860, had been reduced to the city of Rome, itself, as the armies of Victor Emanuel II came down from the north to join up with Garibaldi, the conqueror of the south. King Francis set up a government in exile in Rome that enjoyed diplomatic recognition by most European states for a few years as still the legitimate government of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.
Her wealth and privilege were, to a certain extent, overshadowed by personal tragedies. Her marriage was not consummated for many years, as her husband suffered from phimosis
Phimosis
Phimosis , from the Greek phimos ), is a condition where, in men, the foreskin cannot be fully retracted over the glans penis...
. His shyness and religious fanaticism also prevented the couple from developing any kind of physical intimacy with each other. While in exile in Rome, Maria fell in love with an officer of the papal guard, Armand de Lawayss, and became pregnant by him. She retreated to her parents' home at Possenhofen, where a family council decided that she must give birth in secret to prevent scandal. On 24 November 1862, Maria Sophie gave birth to a daughter in St. Ursula's Convent in Augsburg
Augsburg
Augsburg is a city in the south-west of Bavaria, Germany. It is a university town and home of the Regierungsbezirk Schwaben and the Bezirk Schwaben. Augsburg is an urban district and home to the institutions of the Landkreis Augsburg. It is, as of 2008, the third-largest city in Bavaria with a...
. The child was immediately given to Lawayss' family. Maria Sophia was made to promise that she would never see him again, which deeply affected her. Maria Sophie suffered from depression in later life, which is believed to have been rooted in this event.
A year later, on the advice of her family, Maria Sophia decided to confess the affair to her husband. Afterwards, the relationship between the two improved for a time. Francis submitted to an operation which allowed him to consummate the marriage, and Maria became pregnant a second time, this time by her husband. Both were overjoyed at the turn of events and full of hope. On 24 December 1869, after ten years of marriage, Marie Sophie gave birth to a daughter, Maria Cristina Pia
Princess Cristina of Bourbon-Two Sicilies
Princess Cristina of Bourbon-Two Sicilies was the only child of King Francis II of the Two Sicilies and his wife, Maria Sophie of Bavaria.-Her parents:Exiled to Rome , the Bourbons-Two Sicilies needed to...
. Cristina was born on the birthday of her aunt, Empress Elisabeth, who became her godmother. Unfortunately, the baby lived only three months and died on 28 March 1870. Maria Sophie and her husband never had another child.
Later life
In 1870, Rome fell to the forces of Italy and the King and Queen fled to Bavaria. The king died in 1894. Maria Sophia spent time in MunichMunich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
, and then moved to Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
where she presided over somewhat of an informal Bourbon court-in-exile. It was rumored she was involved in the anarchist
Anarchism
Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...
assassination
Assassination
To carry out an assassination is "to murder by a sudden and/or secret attack, often for political reasons." Alternatively, assassination may be defined as "the act of deliberately killing someone, especially a public figure, usually for hire or for political reasons."An assassination may be...
of King Humbert
Umberto I of Italy
Umberto I or Humbert I , nicknamed the Good , was the King of Italy from 9 January 1878 until his death. He was deeply loathed in far-left circles, especially among anarchists, because of his conservatism and support of the Bava-Beccaris massacre in Milan...
in 1900 in hopes of destabilizing the new nation-state of Italy. Recent historians have resurrected that rumor based on the apparent credence given to this conspiracy theory
Conspiracy theory
A conspiracy theory explains an event as being the result of an alleged plot by a covert group or organization or, more broadly, the idea that important political, social or economic events are the products of secret plots that are largely unknown to the general public.-Usage:The term "conspiracy...
by the then Prime Minister of Italy, Giovanni Giolitti
Giovanni Giolitti
Giovanni Giolitti was an Italian statesman. He was the 19th, 25th, 29th, 32nd and 37th Prime Minister of Italy between 1892 and 1921. A left-wing liberal, Giolitti's periods in office were notable for the passage of a wide range of progressive social reforms which improved the living standards of...
. Others regard it as anecdotal. In any event, the case against Maria Sophia is circumstantial.
During World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, Maria Sophie was actively on the side of the German Empire
German Empire
The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...
and Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...
in their war with the Kingdom of Italy
Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)
The Kingdom of Italy was a state forged in 1861 by the unification of Italy under the influence of the Kingdom of Sardinia, which was its legal predecessor state...
. Again, the rumors claimed she was involved in sabotage and espionage against Italy in the hope that an Italian defeat would tear the nation apart and that the kingdom of Naples would be restored.
During her life, she generated an almost cult-like air of admiration even among her political enemies. Gabriele D'Annunzio
Gabriele D'Annunzio
Gabriele D'Annunzio or d'Annunzio was an Italian poet, journalist, novelist, and dramatist...
called her the "stern little Bavarian eagle" and Marcel Proust
Marcel Proust
Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, critic, and essayist best known for his monumental À la recherche du temps perdu...
spoke of the "soldier queen on the ramparts of Gaeta."
Maria Sophie died in Munich in 1925. From 1984 her remains now rest with those of her husband and their daughter in the Church of Santa Chiara in Naples
Santa Chiara (Naples)
Santa Chiara is a religious complex in Naples, southern Italy, that includes the Church of Santa Chiara, a monastery, tombs and an archeological museum.-Architecture:...
.
Titles and styles
- 4 October 1841 – 3 February 1859 Her Royal Highness Duchess Maria Sophie in Bavaria
- 3 February 1859 – 22 May 1859 Her Royal Highness the Duchess of CalabriaDuchess of CalabriaDuchess of Calabria was the traditional title of the wife of the heir apparent of the Kingdom of Naples after the accession of Robert of Naples. It was also adopted by the heads of certain Houses that had once claimed the Kingdom of Naples in lieu of the royal title.There are at present two...
- 22 May 1859 – 27 December 1894 Her Majesty the Queen of the Two Sicilies
- 27 December 1894 – 19 January 1925 Her Majesty the Dowager Queen of the Two Sicilies