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In 1287 Amadeus besieged the castle of Ile in the Rhône near Geneva, and captured it after fourteen weeks. In 1295, Amadeus acquired the fortress at Chambéry from its previous owner Hugh of La Rochette. He brought Georges de Aquila, a student of Giotto from Florence, to his court. Georges decorated the castle with pain... |
Among his successes was the Treaty of Annemasse which the Count of Geneva and the Dauphin of Viennois accepted subservient roles to him as his vassals. The treaty was the result of military victories over the both of them. In 1301, Amadeus also settled his dispute over control of Valais with the Roman Catholic Diocese ... |
His reign, however, also saw friction between the County of Savoy and the Duchy of Austria. He pursued an alliance with the Kingdom of France and received Maulévrier in Normandy as a result of initial good relations. |
The eventual recovery of Lyon by the Kings of France alerted Amadeus to their expansionistic tendencies towards the regions by the Alps. He sought a powerful ally against potential hostility in the German king Henry VII, who was married to Margaret of Brabant, the sister-in-law of Amadeus. Amadeus accompanied Henry in ... |
In 1315, Amadeus assisted the Knights Hospitaller in the defense of Rhodes against the Turks. |
He first married Sybille de Baugé, daughter of Guy I Damas de Baugé, Baron of Couzan (c.1230-1269) and Dauphine de Lavieu, and had eight children by her: |
In 1297, he married, secondly, Marie of Brabant, who was a daughter of John I, Duke of Brabant and Margaret of Flanders. Her maternal grandparents were Guy of Dampierre and his first wife, Matilda of Bethune. They had 4 children: |
Christine of France (10 February 1606 – 27 December 1663) was the sister of Louis XIII and the Duchess of Savoy by marriage. At the death of her husband Victor Amadeus I in 1637, she acted as regent of Savoy between 1637 and 1648. |
Christine was born in the Palais du Louvre in Paris, she was the third child and second daughter of King Henry IV of France and his second wife, the Italian Marie de' Medici. As a daughter of the king, she was a Daughter of France. She was a younger sister of Louis XIII of France and Elisabeth of France. She was also a... |
After the marriage of her older sister Elisabeth in 1615 to the future Philip IV of Spain, Christine took on the honorary title of "Madame Royale" indicating her status as the eldest and most senior unmarried daughter at the court of her father. After her marriage, the style went to her younger sister Henrietta Maria o... |
Christine married Victor Amadeus I, Duke of Savoy, on 10 February 1619 at the Louvre in the capital. From 1619 till her husband's accession, she was known as the Princess of Piedmont. He was a son of Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy, and Infanta Catherine Michelle of Spain. She was said to be volatile and frivolous. E... |
Victor Amadeus became Duke after the death of his father on 26 July 1630. When Christine's husband died in 1637, she was created regent in the name of her son Francis Hyacinth. At the death of Francis Hyacinth in 1638, her second son Charles Emmanuel II succeeded and Christine retained the regency. Both Prince Maurice ... |
After four years of fighting, Christine was victorious, thanks to French military support. Not only did she keep the Duchy for her son, she also prevented France getting too much power in the Duchy. When peace was concluded in 1642, Maurice married his fourteen-year-old niece Louise Christine, abandoning the title of c... |
She lived an uninhibited private life and had relationships with the French Ambassador, Marini, her brother-in-law, Maurizio, and Count Filippo d'Aglié, a handsome learned and courageous man who remained faithful to her all her life. She encouraged her son Charles Emmanuel to marry her niece Françoise Madeleine d'Orléa... |
Christine died at the Palazzo Madama, Turin on 27 Dec 1663 at the age of 57 and was buried at the Basilica of Sant'Andrea. She had outlived 4 of her seven children. |
Françoise Madeleine died in January 1664 and her son later married another cousin, Marie Jeanne of Savoy. Marie Jeanne would give birth to Victor Amadeus II of Sardinia who would later marry another French Princess (and member of the House of Orléans) Anne Marie d'Orléans. 17 years after her death, in 1680, her grandda... |
In 2010, it was revealed on NBC's "Who Do You Think You Are?" that one of her descendants is model/actress Brooke Shields. Princess Michael of Kent, born Baroness Marie Christine, is also a descendant by Christine's son, Charles Emmanuel. |
Umberto II (; 15 September 190418 March 1983) was the last King of Italy. He reigned for 34 days, from 9 May 1946 to 12 June 1946, although he had been "de facto" head of state since 1944, and was nicknamed the May King (). |
Umberto was the only son among the five children of King Victor Emmanuel III and Queen Elena. In an effort to repair the monarchy's image after the fall of Benito Mussolini's regime, Victor Emmanuel transferred his powers to Umberto in 1944 while retaining the title of king. As a referendum on the abolition of the mona... |
Umberto was brought up in an authoritarian and militaristic household and expected to "show an exaggerated deference to his father"; both in private and public Umberto always had to get down on his knees and kiss his father's hand before being allowed to speak, even as an adult, and he was expected to stand to attentio... |
Umberto was the first cousin of King Alexander I of Yugoslavia. He was accorded the title Prince of Piedmont, which was formalised by Royal Decree on 29 September. In a 1959 interview, Umberto told the Italian newspaper "La Settimana Incom Illustrata" that in 1922 his father had felt that appointing Benito Mussolini pr... |
As Prince of Piedmont, Umberto visited South America, between July and September 1924. With his preceptor, Bonaldi, he went to Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina and Chile. This trip was part of the political plan of Fascism to link the Italian people living outside of Italy with their mother country and the interests of the r... |
In Brazil, visits were scheduled to the national capital Rio de Janeiro and the state of São Paulo, where the largest Italian colony in the country lived. However, a major military rebellion that occurred on July 5, 1924, with Savoia had already departed from Europe, imposed a change in the tour. The prince had to stop... |
Umberto was educated for a military career and in time became the commander-in-chief of the Northern Armies, and then the Southern ones. This role was merely formal, the "de facto" command belonging to his father, King Victor Emmanuel III, who jealously guarded his power of supreme command from "Il Duce", Benito Mussol... |
An attempted assassination took place in Brussels on 24 October 1929, the day of the announcement of his betrothal to Princess Marie José. Umberto was about to lay a wreath on the Tomb of the Belgian Unknown Soldier at the foot of the "Colonne du Congrès" when, with a cry of 'Down with Mussolini!', Fernando de Rosa fir... |
De Rosa was arrested and, under interrogation, claimed to be a member of the Second International who had fled Italy to avoid arrest for his political views. His trial was a major political event, and although he was found guilty of attempted murder, he was given a light sentence of five years in prison. This sentence ... |
In 1928, after the colonial authorities in Italian Somaliland built the Mogadishu Cathedral ("Cattedrale di Mogadiscio"), Umberto made his first publicized visit to Mogadishu, the territory's capital. Umberto made his second publicized visit to Italian Somaliland in October 1934. |
Umberto was married in Rome on 8 January 1930 to Princess Marie José of Belgium (1906–2001), daughter of King Albert I of the Belgians and his wife, Queen Elisabeth, ("née" Duchess Elisabeth in Bavaria). |
In the Salò republic, Mussolini returned to his original republicanism and as part of his attack on the House of Savoy, Fascist newspapers in the area under the control of the Italian Social Republic "outed" Umberto, calling him "Stellassa" ("Ugly Starlet" in Piedmontese language). The Fascist newspapers reported in a ... |
Mack Smith wrote that he called "some of the more extreme monarchists" expressed doubts about the legitimacy of the referendum, claiming that millions of voters, many of them pro-monarchist, were unable to vote because they had not yet been able to return to their own local areas to register. Nor had the issue of Italy... |
Umberto II lived for 37 years in exile, in Cascais, on the Portuguese Riviera. He never set foot in his native land again; the 1948 constitution of the Italian Republic not only forbade amending the constitution to restore the monarchy, but until 2002 barred all male heirs to the defunct Italian throne from ever return... |
He travelled extensively during his exile, and was often seen in Mexico visiting his daughter Maria Beatrice. |
At the time when Umberto was dying, in 1983, President Sandro Pertini wanted the Italian Parliament to allow Umberto to return to his native country. Ultimately, however, Umberto died in Geneva and was interred in Hautecombe Abbey, for centuries the burial place of the members of the House of Savoy. No representative o... |
At birth, Umberto was granted the traditional title of Prince of Piedmont. This was formalised by Royal Decree on 29 September 1904. |
Elisabeth Therese of Lorraine (15 October 1711 – 3 July 1741) was born a Princess of Lorraine and was the last queen consort of Charles Emmanuel III of Sardinia. The sister of Francis Stephan, Duke of Lorraine, she died as a result of giving birth to Benedetto of Savoy. |
In the spring of 1725, the young King Louis XV was fifteen and unmarried. He was engaged to Mariana Victoria of Spain, but the young princess was sent back to Spain because she was too young to conceive. As a result, Élisabeth Charlotte began negotiations to marry her daughter to the king. However, this was met with op... |
The duke of Bourbon stated that marriages between the kings of France and princesses of Lorraine always resulted in strife, and that the House of Lorraine was too closely related to the House of Habsburg, which would cause discontent and conflict with the French nobility. |
Her father died in 1729 amid negotiations regarding a marriage between the then seventeen-year-old Elisabeth Therese and her recently widowed cousin Louis d'Orléans, Duke of Orléans. He refused outright, much to the annoyance of her mother. The match having come to nothing, leading her mother to name her daughter the "... |
In 1736 her brother the Duke of Lorraine married the Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria, daughter and heiress apparent of Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor. The union between the House of Lorraine and the House of Habsburg allowed a more prestigious marriage for the unwed princess. The already twice widowed Charles Emma... |
She married the King of Sardinia by proxy on 5 March 1737 at Lunéville with the Prince of Carignan, who was the prince's brother-in-law, acting as the king. The day after the proxy marriage, she left for Lyon where she arrived on 14 March. Her brother the Duke of Lorraine raised a dowry for her and the marriage contrac... |
The couple married in person on 1 April 1737. Charles Emmanuel III was her half-first cousin, his mother being Anne Marie d'Orléans, her mother Élisabeth Charlotte's half-sister. The marriage would produce three children, but only one would live to adulthood. She and her husband arrived in Turin on 21 April. |
Elisabeth Therese died at the Palace of Venaria aged 29, having fallen ill with puerperal fever after childbirth. She was buried in the Cathedral of Saint Giovanni Battista in Turin. She was moved to the Royal Basilica of Superga in 1786 by her stepson Victor Amadeus III. |
The Civil Order of Savoy was founded as an order of knighthood in 1831 by the King of Sardinia, Charles Albert, Duke of Savoy. The intention was to reward those virtues not belonging to the existing Military Order of Savoy, founded by Vittorio Emanuele I in 1815. The order has one degree, that of Knight ("Cavalieri del... |
The insignia bears the inscription "Al Merito Civile—1831"; the letters on the reverse substituted for after the death of Charles Albert in 1849. |
The civil order was continued on the unification of Italy in 1861, but has been suppressed by law since the foundation of the Republic in 1946. Umberto II did not abdicate his position as "fons honorum" however, and the now dynastic order remains under the Grand Mastership of the head of the former Royal house. While t... |
Prince Louis Thomas of Savoy (; Italian: "Luigi Tommaso di Savoia"; 15 December 1657 – 14 August 1702) was a Count of Soissons and Prince of Savoy. He was killed as Feldzeugmeister of the Imperial Army at the Siege of Landau at the start of the War of the Spanish Succession. There was speculation that he was an illegit... |
Louis Thomas was the eldest son of Eugene Maurice, Count of Soissons and Olympia Mancini, as well as the oldest brother of Prince Eugene of Savoy. He married Uranie , whom Saint-Simon had once described as "radiant as the glorious morn". His daughter Princess Maria Anna Victoria of Savoy eventually inherited Eugene's e... |
After the death of his father and the flight of his mother to Brussels due to her involvement in the notorious Poison affair, Louis Thomas and Urania were charged, along with his paternal grandmother, with the rearing of his younger brothers. Eugene was never to forget the couple's loving surrogate parentage. |
Louis Thomas obtained a commission as an officer in the French Army, but Louis XIV had amorous designs on his wife. Urania, however, spurned the king's romantic advances. Angered, Louis dismissed Louis Thomas from the army, and, when Louis Thomas sought a position abroad, terminated his pension and dues. In 1699, all b... |
On 18 August Louis was killed by a French bomb at the Siege of Landau at the onset of the War of the Spanish Succession. |
Adelaide of Maurienne, also called Alix or Adele (1092 – 18 November 1154) was a queen of France as the second wife of King Louis VI (1115-1137). |
Adelaide was the daughter of Count Humbert II of Savoy and Gisela of Burgundy. Adelaide's older brother Amadeus III succeeded their father as count of Savoy in 1103. Adelaide had the same name as her paternal great-grandmother Adelaide of Susa, ruler of the March of Turin, and her second cousin, Adelaide del Vasto, que... |
Adelaide became the second wife of King Louis VI of France, whom she married on 3 August 1115 in Paris, France. They had nine children, the second of whom became Louis VII of France. |
Adelaide was one of the most politically active of all France's medieval queens. Her name appears on 45 royal charters from the reign of Louis VI. During her tenure as queen, royal charters were dated with both her regnal year and that of the king. Among many other religious benefactions, she and Louis founded the mona... |
After Louis VI's death, Adelaide did not immediately retire to conventual life, as did most widowed queens of the time. Instead, she married Matthieu I of Montmorency, with whom she had one child. She remained active in the French court and religious activities. |
In 1153 she retired to Montmartre Abbey, which she had founded with Louis VII. She died there on 18 November 1154. She was buried in the cemetery of the Church of St. Pierre at Montmartre. The abbey was destroyed during the French Revolution, but Adelaide's tomb is still visible in the church of St Pierre. |
Adelaide is one of two queens in a legend related in the seventeenth century by William Dugdale. As the story goes, Queen Adélaide of France became enamored of a young knight, William d'Albini, at a joust. However, he was already engaged to Adeliza of Louvain and refused to become her lover. The jealous Adélaide lured ... |
Louis and Adelaide had seven sons and two daughters: |
With Matthieu I of Montmorency, Adelaide had one daughter: |
The emblem of the Italian Republic () was formally adopted by the newly formed Italian Republic on 5 May 1948. Although often referred to as a coat of arms (or in Italian), it is technically an emblem as it was designed not to conform to traditional heraldic rules. |
The emblem comprises a white five-pointed star, the "Stella d’Italia" (English: "Star of Italy"), with a thin red border, superimposed upon a five-spoked cogwheel, standing between an olive branch to the left side and an oak branch to the right side; the branches are in turn bound together by a red ribbon with the insc... |
The armorial bearings of the House of Savoy, blazoned "gules a cross argent", were previously in use by the former Kingdom of Italy; the supporters, on either side "a lion rampant Or", were replaced with "fasci littori" (literally bundles of the lictors) during the fascist era. |
The central element of the emblem is the five-pointed star white star, also called "Stella d'Italia" (English: "Star of Italy"), which is the oldest national symbol of Italy, since it dates back to ancient Greece. In this historical epoch Italy was associated with the Star of Venus because it was located west of the He... |
The star marked the first award of Republican reconstruction, the Order of the Star of Italian Solidarity, and still indicates membership of the Armed Forces today. |
In the republican emblem the Star of Italy is superimposed on a steel cogwheel, symbol of work, which is at the base of the Republic. Article 1 of the Italian Constitution reads: |
However, this reference to work should not be understood as a legal rule, which would oblige the State to protect it in detail, but rather to refer to the principle connected to it, which is the foundation of Italian society. The second paragraph, instead, assigning sovereignty exclusively to the people, establishes th... |
The set formed by the cogwheel and the star of Italy is enclosed by an oak branch, located on the right, which symbolizes the strength and dignity of the Italians (in Latin the term "robur" means both oak and moral strength and physics), and from an olive branch, located instead on the left, which represents Italy's wi... |
The refusal of war as an instrument of offense does not follow that Italy cannot participate in a conflict, so much so that articles 78 and 87 of the Constitution prescribe which state organs decide the state of war. In particular, for Italy, it is the two chambers that decree the state of war, which is then formally d... |
The emblem of the Italian Republic cannot be defined as a coat of arms as it has no shield; the latter being in fact, according to the heraldic definition, an essential part of the crests (as opposed to other decorations such as, for example, crowns, helmets or fronds, which are accessory parts). For this reason it is ... |
The Italian naval ensign, since 1947, comprises the national flag defaced with the arms of the Marina Militare; the "Marina Mercantile" (and private citizens at sea) use the civil ensign, differenced by the absence of the mural crown and the lion holding open the gospel, bearing the inscription , instead of a sword. Th... |
To acknowledge the Navy's origins in ancient Rome, the "rostrata" crown, "... emblem of honor and of value that the Roman Senate conferred on "duci" of shipping companies, conquerors of lands and cities overseas," was proposed by Admiral Cavagnari in 1939. An inescutcheon, bearing the Savoy shield flanked by fasces, wa... |
The Esercito Italiano, Aeronautica Militare and Arma dei Carabinieri also have their own distinctive coats of arms as do each of the municipalities, provinces and regions of Italy. |
The Kingdom of Italy was a French client state founded in Northern Italy by Napoleon I, Emperor of the French in 1805. It had a peculiar coat of arms, formed by the arms of the House of Bonaparte augmented by charges from various Italian regions. When Napoleon abdicated the thrones of France and Italy in 1814, the form... |
Between 1848 and 1861, a sequence of events led to the independence and unification of Italy (except for Venetia, Rome, Trento and Trieste, or "Italia irredenta", which were united with the rest of Italy in 1866, 1870 and 1918 respectively); this period of Italian history is known as the "Risorgimento", or resurgence. ... |
On 4 May 1870, nine years later, the Consulta Araldica issued a decree on the arms, as with the Sardinian arms, two "lions rampant" in gold supporting the shield, bearing instead only the Savoy cross (as on the flag) now representing all Italy, with a crowned helmet, around which, the collars of the Military Order of S... |
After twenty years, on 1 January 1890, the arms' exterior were slightly modified more in keeping with those of Sardinia. The fur mantling and lances disappeared and the crown was taken from the helmet to the pavilion, now sewn with crosses and roses. The Iron Crown of Lombardy was placed on the helmet, under the tradit... |
On 11 April 1929, the Savoy lions were replaced by Mussolini with fasces from the National Fascist Party shield. After his dismissal and arrest on 25 July 1943 however, the earlier version was briefly restored until the emblem of the new "Repubblica Italiana" was adopted, after the institutional referendum on the form ... |
The arms of the short-lived Nazi state in northern Italy, the "Repubblica Sociale Italiana" (Italian Social Republic), or "Republic of Salò" as it was commonly known, was that of the governing Republican Fascist Party, a silver eagle clutching a banner of the "tricolore" inverted on a shield charged with fasces. Italia... |
This shield had previously been displayed alongside the Royal arms from 1927 to 1929, when the latter was modified to incorporate elements of both. |
On 25 April 1945, commemorated as Festa della Liberazione, the government of Benito Mussolini fell. The separate Italian Social Republic had existed for slightly more than one and a half years. |
The decision to provide the new Italian Republic with an emblem was taken by the government of Alcide De Gasperi in October 1946. The design was chosen by public competition, with the requirement that political party emblems were forbidden and the inclusion of the Stellone d'Italia (English: "Great Star of Italy"), "in... |
Below a representation of the sea, and above, the gold star, with the legend "Unità e Libertà" or Unity and Liberty in the Italian language. The winner was Paolo Paschetto, Professor of the Institute of Fine Arts in Rome from 1914 to 1948, and the design was presented in February 1947, together with the other finalists... |
Princess Polyxena of Hesse-Rheinfels-Rotenburg (Polyxena Christina Johanna; 21 September 1706 – 13 January 1735) was the second wife of Charles Emmanuel, Prince of Piedmont whom she married in 1724. The mother of the future Victor Amadeus III, she was queen consort of Sardinia from 1730 until her death in 1735. |
Polyxena was born as the eldest daughter of Ernst Leopold, Landgrave of Hesse-Rheinfels-Rotenburg and Princess Eleonore of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Rochefort, daughter of Maximilian Karl Albert, Prince of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Rochefort. |
King Victor Amadeus II of Sardinia approached her family and proposed a union between Polyxena and Victor Amadeus II's son and heir, Charles Emmanuel, Prince of Piedmont. A previous match orchestrated by Agostino Steffani with a daughter of Rinaldo d'Este, Duke of Modena, had come to nothing. His first wife, Countess P... |
Although only two years younger, Polyxena was a niece of Charles Emanuel's first wife, and belonged to the only Roman Catholic branch (since 1652) of the reigning House of Hesse. She had been nominally a canoness of Thorn since 1720. |
The engagement was announced on 2 July 1724, and she wed Charles Emmanuel by proxy on 23 July in Rotenburg. The marriage was celebrated in person at Thonon in Chablais on 20 August 1724. |
Her stepson Victor Amadeus, heir after his father and grandfather to the Sardinian crown, died at the age of two, a year after Polyxena's marriage and before she had a child of her own. Nonetheless, she is said to have had a close relationship with her mother-in-law, Anne Marie d'Orléans, and the two frequented the "Vi... |
When King Victor Amadeus announced his decision to return to the throne after having abdicated in 1730, Polyxena used her influence over her husband to have his father imprisoned at the Castle of Moncalieri, where he was joined for a while by his morganatic wife, Anna Canalis di Cumiana, Polyxena's former lady of the b... |
In an 1869 history of the House of Savoy, Francesco Predari wrote that despite the fact Polyxena was praised for goodness of character and beautiful virtues, her father-in-law advised her to take care to maintain separate quarters from her husband for prudence's sake. In 1732 she founded a home for young mothers in Tur... |
Having been ill since June 1734, she died at the Royal Palace of Turin, and has been buried in the Royal Basilica of Superga since 1786. Two years after her death, her widower married Princess Elisabeth Therese of Lorraine, sister of the future Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor. |
The senior branch of the House of Savoy ended with her grandson Charles Felix of Sardinia. The "Villa Polissena" in Rome is named in her honour. |
Isabella of Savoy (11 March 1591 – 28 August 1626) was a daughter of Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy, and Catherine Michelle of Spain. Her maternal grandparents were Philip II of Spain and Elisabeth of Valois, her paternal grandparents were Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy and Margaret of France, Duchess of Berry. S... |
Isabella was born in Turin to Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy and his wife Infanta Catherine Michelle of Spain, a daughter of Philip II of Spain and Elisabeth of France. |
In Turin on 22 February 1608 she married Alfonso, Hereditary Prince of Modena (son of Cesare d'Este and Virginia de' Medici), this was a happy marriage, Alfonso was loving and loyal towards his wife. Within two years Isabella bore Alfonso a son, Francesco who would one day succeed his father as Duke of Modena and Reggi... |
Isabella and Alfonso had fourteen children in all: |
Maria Carolina of Savoy (Maria Carolina Antonietta Adelaide; 17 January 1764 – 28 December 1782) was a Princess of Savoy from her birth. She was the youngest daughter of the future Victor Amadeus III of Sardinia and married in 1781 to the Electoral Prince of Saxony. She died of Smallpox aged eighteen. |
Born to the Duke and Duchess of Savoy at the Royal Palace of Turin, she was the couple's tenth child and sixth daughter. |
Her sisters included the future granddaughters-in-law of Louis XV of France, Princess Maria Giuseppina, who married the future Louis XVIII of France in 1771 and Princess Maria Teresa, wife of the future Charles X of France, married in 1773. Her sisters' brother in law was the unfortunate Louis XVI of France. |
Her brothers included the last three kings of Sardinia from the main line; the future Charles Emmanuel IV, Victor Emmanuel I and Charles Felix of Sardinia. Her father became king of Sardinia in 1773 at the death of her grandfather Charles Emmanuel III of Sardinia who had ruled Sardinia for 43 years. |
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