Juana de Austria y Xériga

Juana of Austria y Xériga was born in Valencia in 1523 and died there in 1530 at the age of only seven. She was the illegitimate daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and Catalina de Rebolledo, a married court lady from Valladolid who had seven children. Juana therefore grew up during a period when the emperor’s private relationships were closely connected with the political and social structures of his court. The relationship between Charles and Catalina probably began during a visit by King Charles I of Spain, the future Emperor Charles V, to his mother, Joanna the Mad, in Tordesillas. This visit took place between September 2 and 4, 1522. At the time, Catalina worked as a chamberwoman or lady-in-waiting in the queen’s household and was attached to the household of Henry III of Nassau-Breda, an influential nobleman and close confidant of the emperor. Her relationship with Charles resulted in her becoming pregnant. After it became known who the child’s father was, Catalina left Valladolid. She is said to have changed her family name from Rebolledo to Xériga. She went to Valencia, although some accounts instead identify the Netherlands as her destination. Her daughter was born in one of those places at the end of May or the beginning of June 1523. The differing accounts of the place of birth reflect the uncertainty surrounding the surviving information about Juana and her mother. When Juana was about four months old, she and Catalina were taken to the convent of Madrigal de las Altas Torres, outside the town walls in what is now the province of Ávila. The convent belonged to the Order of Saint Augustine. There, mother and daughter were placed under the supervision of the abbess María de Aragón, an illegitimate daughter of Ferdinand the Catholic. Several years later, they returned to Valencia, where they spent the final period of their lives. Juana and Catalina lived under the protection of several powerful figures. Their protectors included Henry III of Nassau-Breda, who at that time was one of Charles V’s most important assistants, and his wife, Mencía de Mendoza y Fonseca. Germana de Foix also supported them. These protective arrangements were of great importance to Catalina and her daughter. Although Juana was acknowledged and provided for as the emperor’s illegitimate child, she did not occupy a prominent public position. Charles V granted mother and daughter a lifelong pension of 15,000 maravedís. This payment provided them with permanent financial support, but according to the surviving assessments it was not especially generous. Despite her imperial descent, Juana therefore led a relatively secluded life, shaped by the care of others and by residence in religious institutions. Her life ended during a period of serious illness. Juana died in Valencia in 1530, probably in connection with a plague epidemic that affected territories of the Crown of Aragon between 1527 and 1530. One possible origin of the outbreak was said to have been its introduction through Barcelona and Marseille. Another possibility was a disease then known as a “throat epidemic” or “garrotillo,” which particularly affected children. These terms were used for diphtheria and other severe, suffocating throat infections, although diphtheria had not yet been clearly identified as a distinct disease. Only a few days or months after Juana’s death, her mother Catalina also died, probably of the plague. Thus ended the short life of a child whose parentage connected her to one of Europe’s most powerful rulers, but who had little opportunity to develop a historical role of her own. What survives about her concerns above all the circumstances of her birth, the places where she lived, and the protective arrangements through which Charles V provided for his daughter and her mother.