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Sunday, November 3, 2024

Empresses, Saints and Female-Kings: The Four Great-Granddaughters of King Ladislaus

 From History...the Interesting Bits:

The night of 19 May 1365 saw a young girl leaving Pisa on horseback. With her hair loose, clad only in her nightgown she was galloping to safety after fire broke out in Palazzo degli Anziani. Judging by her looks no one would have guessed this girl was in fact Holy Roman Empress and Queen of Bohemia. 

Anna of Schweidnitz, Silesia (today Poland), was the only child of Duke Henry II, the grandson of King Ladislaus the Elbow-High of Cracow (Poland). Upon her father’s death she was placed under the care of his elder brother, her uncle, Bolko II the Small. The ruler of the small, but politically important duchy, Bolko was the last independent Silesian Piast. Since Charles IV of Luxembourg intended to annex the entirety of Silesia to the Kingdom of Bohemia, Bolko’s duchy, being the only missing part, was crucial to his plans. To secure the Schweidnitz inheritance Charles married Anna and this is how her journey began. Of course, she was not the only great-granddaughter of King Ladislaus to make an illustrious career. His three other great-granddaughters were to leave their marks on the world, too, and indelible ones. Two of them were to be crowned ”kings” and one proclaimed  saint. (Read more.)

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