Elisabeth Christine von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel

Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel was born on 28 August 1691 in Brunswick. She was the eldest daughter of Louis Rudolph, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, and his wife, Christine Louise, a princess of Oettingen-Oettingen. Through her marriage to Charles VI, she became Empress of the Holy Roman Empire and queen of Germany, Bohemia, Hungary, Sardinia, Sicily, and Naples, as well as holder of numerous other Habsburg titles. She was also renowned for her beauty and, above all, as the mother of Maria Theresa of Austria. Elisabeth Christine was raised as a Protestant. At the age of thirteen, in 1704, she became engaged to the future Emperor Charles VI, who at the time claimed the Spanish throne as Charles III. The match was arranged through negotiations between her grandfather, Anthony Ulrich, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, and Wilhelmine Amalia of Brunswick-Lüneburg, Charles's sister-in-law and the wife of Emperor Joseph I. The marriage required Elisabeth Christine to convert to Catholicism. The young princess initially resisted vehemently and even threatened to take her own life. Eventually, she accepted the marriage and converted to Catholicism in Bamberg on 1 May 1707. At the time, the War of the Spanish Succession was raging. Charles III effectively ruled Catalonia, which had joined his cause, while fighting Philip V of Spain. Charles had established his court in Barcelona. In April 1708, Elisabeth Christine's wedding procession set out. After stopping in Vienna, where she was presented to the imperial court, the dowager empress, and high society, she continued to Genoa. Under the protection of the English navy, she travelled by sea to Barcelona, arriving at the end of July. On 1 August 1708, shortly before her seventeenth birthday, she married the twenty-three-year-old Charles. Charles immediately returned to the army and entrusted his young wife with the regency of his territories. His opponent likewise had his lands governed by a young woman. Thus, while the two kings fought over Spain, the country was administered by two very young regents. The couple's political circumstances changed in 1711. A smallpox epidemic carried off, among others, Emperor Joseph I, Charles's elder brother, as well as the French dauphin and several children of Leopold I, Duke of Lorraine. Since Joseph I left only two minor daughters, who were not eligible for election as emperor, Charles was elected emperor and took the name Charles VI. The resulting renewed concentration of power in the House of Habsburg alarmed Europe. When English support became uncertain, Charles abandoned his claims to Spain and negotiated a compromise peace. That same year, Elisabeth Christine and Charles left Barcelona and returned to Vienna. The marriage gave Elisabeth Christine a brilliant position, but it initially produced no male heir. Three years after the end of the struggle over the Spanish succession, she and Charles had a son, but the child died in infancy. The couple had four children in all. Maria Theresa, born in 1717, and Maria Anna, born in 1718, reached adulthood. Their younger daughter, Maria Amalia, died in 1730 at the age of six. On the orders of her physicians, Elisabeth Christine underwent various treatments and experiments intended to increase her fertility, but she conceived no further child. Some ministers reportedly even considered plotting against her life, but Charles VI did not tolerate this. Concerned about the succession, Charles issued the Pragmatic Sanction. It established that, in the absence of a male heir, his daughters would take precedence over the daughters of his deceased brother. He also made advantageous marriages for his two nieces: Maria Josepha married Augustus III, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, while Maria Amalia married the Elector of Bavaria, the future Emperor Charles VII. These unions strengthened dynastic ties, but they could also enable the families connected by marriage to pursue claims to the Habsburg inheritance in the future. In 1723, the young Francis Stephen of Lorraine came to the Viennese court. The heir to the duchies of Lorraine and Bar was to complete his education there. His family had spent a long period in exile after the French occupation of their territories, but it was closely connected to the imperial family. Before long, people began considering a union between Francis Stephen and Maria Theresa. The marriage took place in 1736 and, unusually for the courtly world of the time, it was also a love match. When Charles VI died after an unsuccessful war against the Turks, Maria Theresa was only twenty-three, politically inexperienced, and pregnant with her first son. Elisabeth Christine supported her daughter in this difficult situation. She had passed on to her not only her beauty but also the energy and courage that sustained the young ruler. Shortly after the beginning of the War of the Austrian Succession, the long-awaited male heir was born in March 1741. As an expression of gratitude, the child was given the name Joseph. In the following years, Maria Theresa had almost one child every year, thereby securing the survival of the dynasty. In 1744, Maria Anna, Elisabeth Christine's second daughter, married Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine, Francis Stephen's brother. The young couple assumed the regency of the Austrian Netherlands and went to Brussels. There Maria Anna became pregnant and died in childbirth shortly before Christmas. The loss deeply affected Maria Theresa and her mother, and Elisabeth Christine's health was permanently damaged by the ordeal. Francis Stephen was elected emperor in 1745, but Maria Theresa herself retained political leadership. Through skilful investments, Francis Stephen increased the wealth of the now Habsburg-Lorraine dynasty. The peace of 1748 preserved most of Maria Theresa's territories and the prestige of her house, although Silesia remained with Prussia. Elisabeth Christine therefore lived to see her daughter secure the dynasty's future and have a large number of grandchildren. Elisabeth Christine died in Vienna on 21 December 1750. She was buried in the Capuchin Crypt, the traditional resting place of members of the Austrian imperial family.