The Dynastic and Political Use of the Image of Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria (1669–1692): The ‘Imagined’ Portraits of the Heiress of the Spanish Monarchy

Abstract

Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria (1669–1692) was the heir to the Spanish Monarchy for almost twenty years, from the death of her mother, Infanta Margarita of Austria, to her own demise on Christmas Eve, 1692. Her image as one of the most prominent members of the Habsburg family, as both the eldest daughter of Emperor Leopold I and niece of Charles II of Spain, was carefully constructed from a very young age, when she appeared in detailed portraits, often with her mother. But she was also presented as the rightful heir to the Spanish Monarchy, not only during her life, but for years after her death. In this article, I want to study the political and dynastic image of Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria, with a special focus on the portraits painted after her death, which presented her both with her young son and as the legitimate heir of the Spanish Monarchy.¹

Notes

1 This article has been published thanks to the support of the department of Early Modern History of the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid and the program Juan de la Cierva-Formación (reference number FJC2018-036328-I) of the Ministry of Science and Innovation of the Spanish Government. In addition, the pictures of several of the portraits and part of its study were undertaken during my research stay in Vienna thanks to the Ernst Mach Grant-Worldwide research programme, funded by the OeAD-GmbH/ICM in the name of the Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research (BMBWF) of the Austrian Government. Lastly, I want to express my gratitude to Mercedes Llorente, Laura Oliván Santaliestra, Wolfram Aichinger, Luis Antonio Ribot García, and Antonio Álvarez-Ossorio Alvariño for the patience, help, and support they have shown me over the years. I also want to thank Philippa Woodcock and Liesbeth Geevers for their editorial help during the article’s publication process.

2 See Rocío Martínez López ‘“La infanta se ha de casar con quien facilite la paz o disponga los medios para la guerra”. Las negociaciones para la realización del matrimonio entre la infanta María Teresa y Leopoldo I (1654–1657)', Revista de Historia Moderna. Anales de la Universidad de Alicante 33 (2015), pp. 79-99, and Lothar Höbelt, ‘“Madrid vaut bien une guerre?”: Marriage Negotiations between the Habsburg Courts 1653–1657', in José Martínez Millán and Rubén González Cuerva (eds), La Dinastía de los Austria. Las relaciones entre la Monarquía Católica y el Imperio (Madrid, 2011), vol. III, pp. 1421-36.

3 During the forty years that separated Louis XIV’s marriage with Maria Teresa of Austria and Charles II’s death in 1700, the French monarch and his court used multiple arguments to defend the idea that the Infanta’s renunciation was legally invalid and, thus, both she and her descendants with the King were the legal heirs of Charles II’s throne, as she was his eldest sister. Regarding the very different nature of said arguments, there are several studies, but I especially recommend Ana Álvarez López, La fabricación de un imaginario. Los embajadores de Luis XIV y España (Madrid, 2008) and Luis Ribot García, Orígenes políticos del testamento de Carlos II. La gestación del cambio dinástico en España (Madrid, 2010).

4 Regarding the negotiations, problems and delays related to the marriage negotiations between the Infanta Margarita and Leopold I, see Oliván Santaliestra, Laura, ‘“Giovane d’anni ma vecchia di giudizio”: La emperatriz Margarita, en la corte de Viena’, in Martínez Millán, and González Cuerva (eds), La Dinastía, vol. II, pp. 837-995.

5 Regarding Maria Antonia of Austria’s position as Charles II’s heir, see Rocío Martínez López, ‘El Imperio y Baviera frente a la sucesión de Carlos II. Las relaciones diplomáticas de la Monarquía de España (1665–1699)’, Ph. D. dissertation, Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED) (Madrid, 2018), and by the same author, ʽArchduchess Maria Antonia of Austria, the “Forgotten” Heiress of the Spanish Monarchy (1669–1692)', in Sarah Betts and Chloë McKenzie (eds), Queens in Waiting: Potential and Prospective Queens, Ambitions and Expectations (Routledge, forthcoming). Regarding the reasons that Charles II had to finally name his great-nephew, Philip of Bourbon, duke of Anjou, as his universal heir, contradicting his earlier two testaments and the dispositions taken in this regard during almost all his reign, see Ribot García, Orígenes politicos.

6 Regarding the ways in which Charles II singled out and recognised Maria Antonia of Austria as his heir, treating her differently from the rest of his female relatives of the same rank, see Rocío Martínez López, ʽ“For her Special Consideration”. Cultural and Diplomatic Demonstrations of Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria’s Position as the Heiress of then Spanish Monarchy (1673–1692)', Bulletin for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies. Journal of the Association for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies 45 (2020), pp. 1-16.

7 For example, in the marriage contract that was signed for this wedding, which never took place, the possibility was contemplated that Maria Antonia could become a widow without any children by the King. In that case, it was specified that she would inherit all the territories of the Spanish Monarchy, as the recipient of the succession rights that her mother held, a clause whose inclusion the Emperor accepted without reservations at that time. See Capitulaciones matrimoniales del Rey Nuestro Señor con la señora Archiduquesa doña María Antonia en San Lorenzo a 15 de octubre de 1676. Archivo Histórico Nacional (hereafter AHN), Estado, leg. 2799.

8 Martínez López, ‘El Imperio y Baviera’, esp. pp. 143-239.

9 Several studies have been published which focus on the political meaning of the representation of royal women, and the depiction of their power during the Early Modern Age. Amongst them, I especially recommend Geraldine A. Johnson and Sara F. Matthews Grieco, Picturing Women in Renaissance and Baroque Italy (Cambridge, 1997); Annemarie Jordan Gschwend, ʽLos retratos de Juana de Austria posteriores a 1554: la imagen de una Princesa de Portugal, una Regente de España y una jesuita', Reales Sitios: Revista del Patrimonio Nacional 151 (2002), pp. 42-65 and María Kusche, Retratos y retratadores. Alonso Sánchez Coello y sus competidores Sofonisba Anguissola, Jorge de la Rúa y Rolán Moys (Madrid, 2003).

10 See especially Maria Goloubeva, The Glorification of Emperor Leopold I in Image, Spectacle and Text (Mainz, 2000); Rouven Pons, “Wo der gekrönte Löw hat seiner Kayser-Sitz”. Herrschaftsrepräsentation am Wiener Kaiserhof zur Zeit Leopolds I (Frankfurt, Munich and New York, 2001); Jutta Schumann, Die andere Sonne: Kaiserbild und Medienstrategien im Zeitalter Leopolds I (Berlin, 2003) and Friedrich Polleroβ, ʽEntre “majestas” y “modestas”: Sobre la representación del emperador Leopoldo I', in Fernando Checa Cremades (ed.), Cortes del Barroco: de Bernini y Velázquez a Luca Giordano (Madrid, 2003), pp. 151-60.

11 A digitalised version of this engraving can be seen at the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek (ÖNB), at the following link: https://digital.onb.ac.at/rep/osd/?BAG_4612764.

12 Regarding the image of Charles II as a child, see Álvaro Pascual Chenel, El Retrato de Estado durante el reinado de Carlos II. Imagen y propaganda (Madrid, 2010). For this discussion, see especially its first chapter, titled ‘La minoría de edad y la regencia’, pp. 25-85. See also Eric Young, ʽPortraits of Carlos II of Spain in British Collections', The Burlington Magazine 126, n° 977 (1984), pp.488-93.

13 Álvaro Pascual Chenel, ʽRetórica del poder y persuasión política. Los retratos dobles de Carlos II y Mariana de Austria', Goya 331 (2010), esp. pp. 133-35, and also Eric Young, ʽRetratos pintados de Carlos II en el Museo Lázaro Galdiano', Goya 193 (1986), pp. 126-30. For the portraits of Charles II during his childhood and first years of adulthood, and the main painters of Madrid’s court during his reign, see Alfonso Emilio Pérez Sánchez, Juan Carreño de Miranda (1614–1685) (Avilés, 1985) and the catalogue of the exhibition of the Prado Museum titled Carreño, Rizi, Herrera y la pintura madrileña de su tiempo: 1650–1700, with an introduction by Alfonso Emilio Pérez Sánchez (Madrid, 1986). The painting of the King as a child surrounded by his ancestors can be seen in the online catalogue of the Lázaro Galdiano Museum, in the following link: http://catalogo.museolazarogaldiano.es/mlgm/search/pages/ResultSearch?txtSimpleSearch=Carlos%20II%20ni%F1o%20y%20sus%20antepasados&simpleSearch=0&hipertextSearch=1&search=simple&MuseumsSearch=&MuseumsRolSearch=55&listaMuseos=null. The aforementioned double portrait of the King and his mother was sold at auction in 1997 to an unknown buyer, but can still be seen in the online resource Artnet, in the following link: http://www.artnet.com/artists/sebastian-de-herrera-barnuevo/retrato-de-carlos-ii-ni%C3%B1o-con-su-madre-la-rein-aa-tvCcY74ak0BggAcpbZweGQ2.

14 See Victor Minguez, ‘Unico Universus. El Espejo Dinástico’, La invención de Carlos II. Apoteosis simbólica de la Casa de Austria (Madrid, 2013), pp. 59-81.

15 Pascual Chenel, El Retrato de Estado, p. 57. See also Alfonso Rodríguez G. de Ceballos, ʽRetrato de Estado y propaganda política: Carlos II (en el tercer centenario de su muerte)', 78 Anuario del Departamento de Historia y Teoría del Arte (UAM), vol. XII (2000), pp. 97-99.

16 Another example connected with Leopold I’s court is the Alchimistenmedaillon, in which the figures of the Emperor and his third wife are surrounded by important personages of the Habsburg dynasty through History. Alchimistenmedaillon, 1677, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Münzkabinett, 27bβ.

17 Christoph Stölzl attributes this portrait, although with some doubts, to Gerard du Château, Kurfürst Max Emanuel. Bayern und Europa um 1700 (Munich, 1976), vol. II, p. 36.

18 Laura Oliván indicates that the Empress usually wore clothes that followed the Spanish style and that she only changed her attire to wear German clothes on very specific occasions. This was important from a ceremonial and political point of view. Laura Oliván Santaliestra, ʽ“Giovane d’anni”', pp. 865-66. For Spanish fashions of this period, and its significant influence at the Viennese court, see especially José Luis Colomer and Amalia Descalzo (eds), Vestir a la Española en las cortes europeas (siglos XVI y XVII) (Madrid, 2014), in particular the chapters by Carmen Bernis and Amalia Descalzo, and Ruth Matilda Anderson, Hispanic Costume, 1480–1530 (New York, 1979). The guardainfante, worn by Empress Margarita both here and in the family portrait at the Franziskanerkirche, had a very important political meaning, see Amanda Wunder, ʽWomen’s Fashions and Politics in Seventeenth-Century Spain: The Rise and Fall of the Guardainfante', Renaissance Quaterly 68 (2015), pp. 133-86 and Amanda Wunder, ʽInnovation and Tradition at the Court of Philip IV of Spain (1621–1665): The Invention of the golilla and the guardainfante', in Evelyn Welch (ed.), Fashioning the Early Modern: Dress, Textiles and Innovation in Europe, 1500–1800 (Oxford, 2017), pp. 111-33; Carmen Bernis, ʽVelázquez y el Guardainfante', in Velázquez y el arte de su tiempo. V jornadas de arte (Madrid, 1991), pp. 49-60 and Aileen Ribeiro, ʽSome Evidence of the Influence of the Dress of the Seventeenth Century on Costume in Eighteenth Century Female Portraiture', Burlington Magazine 119, n° 897 (1977), pp. 832-40.

19 For portraits of Habsburg children, see especially Mercedes Llorente, ʽPortraits of Children at the Spanish Court in the Seventeenth Century: The Infanta Margarita and the Young King Carlos II', Bulletin for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies 35 (2011), pp. 43-60, and Gemma Cobo Delgado, ʽRetratos infantiles en el reinado de Felipe III y Margarita de Austria: entre el afecto y la política', Anuario del Departamento de Historia y Teoría del Arte 25 (2013), pp. 23-42.

20 For the appearance of the Hofburg and other royal residences near Vienna around 1672, see the engravings made by Georg Matthäus Vischer for Topographia archiducatus Austriae inferiores modernae, created in 1672. For the evolution of the Viennese Hofburg, see Herbert Karner (ed.), Die Wiener Hofburg, 1521–1705: Baugeschichte, Funktion und Etablierung als Kaiserresidenz (Vienna, 2014).

21 I want to thank Laura Oliván Santaliestra for letting me know about this magnificent painting and for taking me to see it during our stay in Vienna several years ago. I also want to thank Wolfram Aichinger, who helped me tremendously to contact the officers of the Franziskanerkirche to obtain permission to include it in this work and Father Oliver, who kindly attended to me in this regard.

22 Víctor Mínguez and Inmaculada Rodríguez Moya, El tiempo de los Habsburgo. La construcción artística de un linaje imperial en el Renacimiento (Madrid, 2020), pp. 281-372.

23 Even Anna Coreth, in her famous work about the Pietas Austriaca during the Baroque era, indicates that the devotion to the Franciscan order of the Austrian branch of the Habsburg dynasty came directly from their Spanish connections. Anna Coreth, Pietas Austriaca. Österreichische Frömmigkeit im Barock (Vienna, 1982), pp. 49-51.

24 Friedrich Polleroβ, ʽDie Immaculata, Kaiser Leopold I. und ein römisches Thesenblatt der Laibacher Franziskaner', Acta Historiae Artis Slovenica, 23/1(2018), pp. 96-97.

25 Nowadays, this portrait is exhibited at Schloss Ambras, in Innsbruck, as a permanent loan from the Kunsthistorisches Museum.

26 It is possible that the jewels that Maria Antonia of Austria wears in this portrait belonged to her mother, as the Archduchess, as her universal heiress, inherited all her precious objects, with the exceptions of some pieces which were bequeathed to other people among her family and entourage. Most of the pieces of jewellery that were left by the Empress to other people were not specified and she asked the Emperor to decide which ones they would receive, so we do not know exactly which pieces ended up in the Archduchess’ hands. But in the inventory of the Empress’ possessions made immediately after her death we find several pieces and jewellery sets made of pearls, in particular one that included ‘[…] a pair of diamond and pearls arrancas, each one with a pendant, in which there is a big pear-shaped pearl, surrounded by diamonds; two springs of pearls for the hands of the same pearls and diamonds, and a necklace, also of said pearls and diamonds, that have forty-five pieces, and do not have any pendant in its centre […]’. It is possible that the jewels that the Archduchess wears in this very well-known portrait come from this set that her mother brought to Vienna with her from Spain in 1666. Testament der Kaiserin Margarethe, erste Gemahlin Kaiser Leopold I, Haus-, Hof, und Staatsarchiv (hereafter, HHStA), UR FUK 1744, and Inventario de las joyas, plata labrada y otras diferentes alhajas de la Augustíssima Señora Emperatriz doña Margarita María de Austria, infante de España, que está en el Cielo, HHStA, UR FUK 1745/1, 2.

27 It is interesting to point out here that the name ‘Margarita’ means ‘pearl’ in Latin, and that is the reason why there were many references to this jewel in the writings and iconography linked to the Empress. For the importance of jewels and their connection with fashion and the representation of royal women, see Margarita Pérez Grande, ʽLa colección de joyas del Instituto Valencia de Don Juan de Madrid. Obras escogidas de los siglos XVI–XVII', in Vestir las joyas. Modas y Modelos. II Congreso Europeo de Joyería (Madrid, 2015), pp. 70-86, and several of the works of Letizia Arbeteta, especially El arte de la joyería en la colección Lázaro Galdiano (Segovia, 2003) and ʽJoyas de la época de Velázquez en la colección del Museo de Artes Decorativas', V jornadas de arte (Madrid, 1991), pp. 373-84.

28 For the representation of empresses during the seventeenth century, see the Katrin Keller, Die Kaiserin. Reich, Ritual und Dynastie (Vienna, 2021). Regarding the political dimension of the portraits of the Habsburg women, this study is more focused on the Spanish branch of the dynasty, see Álvaro Pascual Chenel, ʽEntre regentes y consortes. Mujer, poder y cultura política en el retrato de las reinas de la Monarquía de España durante la Edad Moderna', in Cristina Bravo Lozano and Roberto Quirós Rosado (eds), La corte de los chapines: mujer y sociedad política en la Monarquía de España (Milan, 2018), pp. 241-342.

29 The engraving made by Elias Christoph Heiss has been digitised by the Österreichisches Nationalbibliothek and can be seen freely on its website, through the following link: https://search.onb.ac.at/primo-explore/fulldisplay?docid=ONB_alma21433095930003338&context=L&vid=ONB&lang=de_DE&search_scope=ONB_gesamtbestand&adaptor=Local%20Search%20Engine&tab=default_tab&query=any,contains,Elias%20Christoph%20Heiss&facet=rtype,include,Grafik&offset=20.

30 Cölestin Wolfsgruber, Die Kaisergruft bei den Kapuzinern in Wien (Vienna, 1887), pp. 146-47.

31 Lustheim Palace, located on lands belonging to the ‘Old Palace’ (Altes Schloss) of the Schleiβheim Palace, began to be built in May 1684, practically at the same time at which the negotiations for the marriage between Maximilian II Emanuel and Maria Antonia were concluded. It was finished by 1689 and in 1690 the Elector organised several entertainments for a visit by the Emperor Leopold I and his family that included a tour through the most important State rooms of the Old Palace of Schleiβheim. Taking into account that this palace was decorated to reflect the greater glory of the Wittelsbach dynasty, this visit, at a time when the political relationship between the Emperor and the Elector was not at its best, was a true testament of Maximilian II Emanuel’s desire to show his power and political strength through the arts. Samuel John Klingensmith, The Utility of Splendor: Ceremony, Social Life and Architecture at the Court of Bavaria, 1600–1800 (Chicago, 1993), p. 77.

32 Klingensmith, The Utility of Splendor, pp. 40-41.

33 José María de Francisco Olmos, ʽLa sucesión de Carlos II y la archiduquesa María Antonia de Austria (1669–1692): una reina de España en potencia', Hidalguía 59, n° 354 (2012), pp. 654-55. The inscriptions of this last example, as well as more information about it, can be read in Kurfürst Max Emanuel, vol. II, p. 97.

34 Kurfürst Max Emanuel, vol. I, pp. 96-97. The Bayerische Nationalbibliothek of Munich conserves a volume of this work that can be read online under the title Foedus Leonis et Aquilae, Paul Aler, Alstorff, Coloniae Aggripinae, 1685, signature Res/2 Bavar. 296.

35 Seeling uses as an example the images published by the Jesuits of the celebration that they organised for the birth of Joseph Ferdinand, on 23 May 1693. In one of them, Joseph Ferdinand was compared to a pearl that the Genius of Life tore out of the lifeless shell that was his mother’s body. Lorenz Seelig, ‘Aspekte des Herrscherlobs — Max Emanuel in Bildnis und Allegorie’, in Kurfürst Max Emanuel, vol. I, p. 11. As indicated above, Maria Antonia died weeks after giving birth to her only surviving son. Recently, numerous works have been published related to the study of pregnancy and birth, and their associated rituals related to the women of the Habsburg dynasty. In this regard, I especially recommend the works of María Cruz de Carlos Varona, Nacer en palacio. El ritual del nacimiento en la corte de los Austrias (Madrid, 2018) and, by the same author ʽGiving Birth at the Habsburg Court: Visual and Material Culture', in Anne J. Cruz and Maria Galli Stampino (eds), Early Modern Habsburg Women. Transnational Contexts, Cultural Conflicts, Dynastic Continuities, (Farnham, 2013), pp. 151-74.

36 Papeles varios referentes a los bienes de la reina Mariana de Austria, Biblioteca Nacional de España (hereafter BNE), Mss./9196, fol. 44v.

37 Papeles varios referentes a los bienes de la reina Mariana de Austria, BNE, Mss./9196, fol. 21v.-23v., 36r.-36v., 44v., 46v.-47r., 51r.-51v.

38 Both Mercedes Llorente and Laura Oliván Santaliestra have referred to the prominent place given to the portrait of Empress Margarita in mourning and its political meaning. Laura Oliván Santaliestra, ʽ“Giovane d’anni”', pp. 837-38, and Mercedes Llorente, ʽImagen y autoridad en una regencia: los retratos de Mariana de Austria y los límites del poder', Studia Histórica. Historia Moderna 28 (2006), pp. 215-16. For the Palace of Uceda as one of the most important political centres of the Spanish Monarchy during the last decades of the seventeenth century, see Silvia Z. Mitchell, Queen, Mother and Stateswoman. Mariana of Austria and the Government of Spain (Pennsylvania State University Press, 2019), pp. 227-33.

39 Lorenz Seeling specifically indicates that a very important number of all the artistic commissions that Maximilian II Emanuel of Bavaria conducted during the last decade of the seventeenth century were devoted to his son and heir. Seeling, ʽAspekte des Herrscherlobs', pp. 10-11.

40 Hercules was a mythical figure linked to the Spanish Habsburgs, who considered him one of their ancestors. They used his image frequently to show the power and strength of their dynasty, so the choice of Hercules to represent Joseph Ferdinand is also telling. See Marie Tanner, The Last Descendants of Aeneas. The Hapsburg and the Mythic Image of the Emperor (New Haven,1993).

41 It is usual for the portrait of Joseph Vivien to be called ‘Joseph Ferdinand of Bavaria as prince of Asturias’. Even though the young prince never received this title, which the king of Castile usually awarded to his legitimate successor, it is very common in German historiography to see him designated as such. An example of this can be seen in the interesting exhibition focused on the young prince, opened in 2012 by the Bayerische Haupstaatsarchiv of Munich, titled Kinderleben im Konzert der Mächte. Kurprinz Joseph Ferdinand, Fürst von Asturien (1692–1699). Regarding the mentioned portraits, conserved at the Residenz of Munich and the Berchtesgaden Palace respectively, see Johannes Erichsen and Katharina Heinemann (eds), Die Schlacht von Höchstädt/The Battle of Blenheim. Brennpunkt Europas, 1704 (Ulm, 2004), p. 104, and Kurfürst Max Emanuel, vol. II, p. 136.

42 Seelig, ʽAspekte des Herrscherlobs', vol. I, pp. 11 and 15.

43 Lorenz Seeling mentions the existence of a second version of this image, in a worse state of preservation, which is also conserved at the Residenz Palace. Kurfürst Max Emanuel, vol. II, p. 136.

44 To date, I do not know of any research that includes any mention of this portrait. At the moment, it is exhibited at the New Palace of Schleiβheim, in the room called ‘Galerieraum mit Model’.

45 It is interesting to note that Prince Joseph Ferdinand of Bavaria, despite his early death, has been the focus of several studies through the centuries. In fact, he was especially important during the rise of the nationalist historiography of the nineteenth century, when he was presented as the great ‘lost hope’ of Bavaria. In this sense, see Karl Theodor von Heigel, Kurprinz Joseph Ferdinand von Bayern und die spanische Erbfolge (Munich, 1879).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Rocío Martínez López

Rocío Martínez López

Rocío Martínez López is Assistant Professor at the Department of Early Modern History at the Autonoma University of Madrid. She obtained her Ph. D. in Early Modern History in December 2018 from the Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED) and her dissertation, tutored by Doctor Luis Antonio Ribot García, obtained the qualification of magna cum laude, as well as the Extraordinary Doctorate Award given by the UNED in 2020. She has been awarded several national and international research grants and has made research stays at the University of Vienna and the Ludwig-Maximilians Universität of Munich, amongst other institutions. She is a specialist on the problem of Charles II of Spain’s succession, the political and diplomatic relationship between the Emperor, the Imperial Prince-Electors and the Spanish Monarchy during the seventeenth century, and the study of royal women’s succession rights in the Europe of the Early Modern Period, about which she has written several articles and book chapters in Spanish and in English.