Princess Maria Annunciata of Bourbon-Two Sicilies
Princess Maria Annunciata Isabella Filomena Sebasia of Bourbon-Two Sicilies was a political figure from the House of Bourbon-Two Sicilies. In 1862, she married Archduke Karl Ludwig of Austria, however, their marriage was short-lived due to her death from tuberculosis in 1871. She is known for being the mother of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, whose assassination in Sarajevo precipitated the start of World War I.
Photograph of Princess Maria Annunciata, published as a postcard in Europe (photograph by Ludwig Angerer, ca. 1865)
Maria Anunciata and her husband Archduke Karl Ludwig sitting at a table, ca. 1870
Maria Anunciata with her children
The exterior of the Capuchin Church, in which Maria Annunciata is buried
House of Bourbon-Two Sicilies
The House of Bourbon-Two Sicilies is a cadet branch of the House of Bourbon that ruled Southern Italy and Sicily for more than a century in the 18th and 19th centuries. It descends from the Capetian dynasty in legitimate male line through Philip, Duke of Anjou, a younger grandson of Louis XIV of France (1638–1715) who established the Bourbon dynasty in Spain in 1700 as Philip V (1683–1746). In 1759, King Philip's younger grandson was appanaged with the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily, becoming Ferdinand IV and III (1751–1825), respectively, of those realms. His descendants occupied the joint throne, merged as the "Kingdom of the Two Sicilies" in 1816, until 1861, claimed it thereafter from exile, and constitute the extant Bourbon-Two Sicilies family.
Family tree
Image: Ferdinand i twosicilies
Image: Francis I of the Two Sicilies
Image: Giuseppe Bonolis Ritratto di Ferdinando II di Borbone