Maria Annunciata of Bourbon-Two Sicilies was born on 24 March 1843 as the daughter of King Ferdinand II of the Two Sicilies and his second wife Maria Theresa of Austria, a granddaughter of Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor and Maria Luisa of Spain. She was known in the family as Ciolla. From her father’s first marriage to Maria Cristina of Savoy, she had one elder half-brother, the future King Francis II of the Two Sicilies. Her father’s second marriage to her mother produced a total of 12 children, though not all of Maria Annunciata’s siblings lived to adulthood.
Her mother preferred to remain at home to take care of the children, and Maria Annunciata shared her mother’s calm and modest lifestyle. Her father died on 22 May 1859, and he was succeeded by her eldest brother Francis. Not much later, the Kingdom was invaded, and the family was forced to flee, first to Gaeta and then to Rome. The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies came to an end on 20 March 1861, and it was absorbed into the Kingdom of Italy.
Maria Annunciata’s brother Prince Louis, Count of Trani, married Empress Elisabeth’s sister Mathilde Ludovika in 1861 while her elder half-brother King Francis II of the Two Sicilies had married also married another one of Empress Elisabeth’s sisters – Marie Sophie – in 1859. While the family was in Rome, Maria Annunciata’s marriage to Karl Ludwig of Austria, a younger brother of Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria, was negotiated. He had been married once before to Princess Margaretha of Saxony, but she had died of typhoid in 1858 at the age of 18, after almost two years of marriage. According to a letter by Franz Joseph to his mother, Karl Ludwig was “very in love and happy.”1 Their proxy wedding eventually took place on 16 October 1862 in Rome. After the proxy wedding, Maria Annunciata travelled to Venice, where the second wedding ceremony would take place. Karl Ludwig and Maria Annunciata were married in person on 22 October. A notable absentee at the wedding was her new sister-in-law, Empress Elisabeth, although another sister-in-law, Charlotte, was present. During the ceremony, Maria Annunciata had suddenly grabbed the hand of her new mother-in-law Archduchess Sophie and said, “Dear mother, I have swallowed something, I have swallowed something.”2 She suddenly threw her head back, and her eyes rolled back into her head before falling to the ground with a terrible scream – she suffered an epileptic seizure.
Sophie was shocked, as was Karl Ludwig, and Sophie later wrote, “The slowly broken happiness, the poor child unaware of all the misery she unconsciously brings upon us! Poor Karl!”2 Luckily, Maria Annunciata recovered from this wedding nightmare and the newlyweds first went to live in Görz before moving to Graz. The castle of Artstetten, owned by her father-in-law, was chosen as their country residence, though Maria Annunciata did not wish to live in the country. The young family would eventually spend the winters in Vienna, spring and autumn at their hunting lodge and the summers at Artstetten.
Despite her serious health problems, Maria Annunciata gave birth to four children in quick succession: Archduke Franz Ferdinand (born 1863), Archduke Otto (born 1865), Archduke Ferdinand Karl (born 1868) and Archduchess Margarete Sophie (born 1870). Empress Elisabeth was present for the baptism of Maria Annunciata’s second son Otto, as was the widowed Empress Caroline Augusta.
Within a year of their marriage, Maria Annunciata had been diagnosed with tuberculosis. As her illness became worse, Maria Annunciata was unable to be the mother she had wanted to be. She did not want to infect her children, and she forbade them to touch her, kiss her or even be around her. She lived in virtual isolation and grew steadily weaker.3
After much suffering, she finally died on 4 May 1871 at the age of just 28 in the arms of her husband. On 7 May, her body was carried in a litter to the Imperial Crypt, where she was laid to rest. Through her second son, she was the grandmother of Emperor Charles I of Austria, the last Emperor of Austria.
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