Maria Ludovika Beatrix von Österreich-Este

Maria Ludovika Beatrix of Austria-Este was born Maria Luigia on 14 December 1787 in Monza. She was the youngest daughter of Archduke Ferdinand Karl and Maria Beatrice d’Este. Her father, a son of Emperor Francis I Stephen and Maria Theresa, served as Austria’s governor of Lombardy. Among her siblings were Francis IV, the future Duke of Modena, and Maximilian Joseph, who later became Grand Master of the Teutonic Order, as well as several other brothers and sisters. Maria Ludovika initially grew up in Milan and at her father’s palace in Monza. Her education was shaped by the strict court etiquette associated with Maria Theresa. She was brought up jointly by her mother and a governess sent to Milan by Maria Theresa, and grew up bilingual. Since Italian was spoken almost exclusively at home and in her lessons, she later spoke German only imperfectly. Her childhood changed dramatically when Napoleon Bonaparte conquered Milan in 1796. The family first fled to Trieste and then to Wiener Neustadt. During this period, her mother instilled in her a lifelong hatred of Napoleon. Compared with their affluent life in Milan, the family’s exile was considerably more modest. In 1803 they moved to Vienna, to the Palais Dietrichstein on Minoritenplatz, where Maria Ludovika’s father died in December 1806. After the death of his second wife, the 39-year-old Emperor Francis II, later Emperor Francis I of Austria, took an interest in Maria Beatrice’s family. During visits to his aunt’s home, he developed a close relationship with her 19-year-old daughter, Maria Luigia. Despite their considerable age difference, they married on 6 January 1808 in an elaborate ceremony. The wedding was conducted by Maria Ludovika’s youngest brother, Karl Ambrosius, who was a bishop. Maria Luigia now became Maria Ludovika. Writers including August Wilhelm Schlegel and Madame de Staël praised the bride’s beauty and grace. The new empress differed sharply from her reserved and rather restrained husband. She was temperamental, politically determined, and possessed a strong understanding of people. Her firm opposition to Napoleon soon made her a leading voice within Austria’s pro-war faction. In Vienna, many feared that she would persuade the emperor to resume the war against France after Austria’s severe defeats and the peace settlement of 1806. The French ambassador also protested against the marriage. Maria Ludovika did not intend to limit herself to ceremonial duties or to raising the children from her husband’s second marriage. She took an active role in politics and thereby came into conflict with Francis, who wished to preserve peace. Supported by Foreign Minister Johann Philipp von Stadion and several military commanders, she tried to persuade Francis to adopt a more decisive policy toward Napoleon. At her coronation as Queen of Hungary in Pressburg on 7 September 1808, she impressed the Hungarian estates so deeply that they were prepared to support the monarchy financially and militarily despite considerable hardship. She also played an important part in making the war popular in Austria. In the cathedral of St. Stephen, she personally attached embroidered flag ribbons for the army to their staffs. Her political views stood in sharp opposition to those of Klemens Wenzel Lothar von Metternich, who considered an open struggle for power with Napoleon too dangerous for Austria. During the war, Maria Ludovika displayed not only determination but also a strong sense of justice. She criticized Archduke John for calling on the Tyroleans to fight Bavaria, even though Tyrol had officially been ceded to Bavaria in 1805. When Napoleon occupied Vienna in 1809, the empress stayed with Francis’s children in the fortress of Ofen. She was seriously ill but encouraged her husband to persevere. A chronic lung condition, coughing, and fever weakened her. Her physician complained that she took too little rest and continued, despite her illness, to concern herself with her stepchildren and political affairs. After the Peace of Schönbrunn, she feared that Napoleon would ultimately deny Austria its independence as a state. Metternich’s influence over the emperor steadily increased, and he thwarted several of Maria Ludovika’s political marriage plans. She had hoped to bring Russia into the struggle against France by arranging a marriage between Archduke Charles and a sister of the Russian empress. Her plan for her brother Francis to marry her stepdaughter Marie Louise also failed. Instead, at Metternich’s urging, Marie Louise was married to Napoleon. The horrified Maria Ludovika was even required to act as the bride’s mother at the proxy wedding and lead her stepdaughter to the altar. The political tensions and her growing estrangement from her husband further damaged her already fragile health. In June 1810 she went to Karlsbad for a cure and temporarily recovered. She appeared in a play by August von Kotzebue and met Johann Wolfgang von Goethe for the first time. The poet was impressed by her intellectual abilities, wrote poems about her, and introduced her to German authors. They met again in Teplitz in 1812. After Napoleon’s failed invasion of Russia, Metternich also supported an alliance between Austria, Prussia, and Russia. Maria Ludovika’s years of urging improvements to the Austrian army nevertheless helped Austria play an important role in the eventual victory over France. At the Congress of Vienna, Maria Ludovika fulfilled her representative duties as hostess to Europe’s leading politicians. The Hofburg became the center of international aristocratic society, but the exhausting receptions again weakened her health. After Napoleon’s final defeat, she stated that she no longer felt hatred toward him because her political goal had been achieved. The estates formerly taken from her Este family were restored. She opposed greater popular participation in politics and also rejected the idea that the Habsburgs should once again assume the office of Holy Roman Emperor. In 1815 and 1816 she traveled with her husband through Bavaria and liberated northern Italy. The couple received lavish receptions in Venice, Milan, and other cities, but Maria Ludovika already felt gravely ill. By March 1816 she could no longer rise from her bed in Verona. The doctors were powerless against the tuberculosis then ravaging the region. Maria Ludovika died childless at the Palazzo Canossa on 7 April 1816, aged only 28. Francis remained at her bedside until the end. In accordance with Habsburg tradition, her remains were divided among the Imperial Crypt, the Heart Crypt, and the Ducal Crypt. On the day of her Hungarian coronation, Maria Ludovika had received a gift of 50,000 gulden. She donated the money to establish a military academy in Pest, which was named the Ludoviceum after her and remained in existence until the end of Austria-Hungary in 1918. Six months after her death, Francis married again. Goethe continued to remember Maria Ludovika for many years. Her extensive library is now held by the National Library in Vienna.