![]() Franz Ferdinand never forgave his uncle for trying to stand in the way of their marriage. The archduke’s demands, like modernizing the navy, retiring long-time military chiefs, and forming alliances with the Russian Empire - in addition to Franz Ferdinand’s pushy personality - irritated Franz Joseph.īut the greatest strain on their relationship? Sophie. “The comfortable ways of Franz Joseph were leading (the empire) to the grave,” said Wawro. The emperor, nearly 70-years-old at the turn of the century, often spent 14 hours a day at his desk buried in bureaucratic matters. ![]() “He was quite prepared to rock lots of boats,” Cohen said.Įmperor Franz Joseph, on the other hand, preferred more tranquil conditions. He wanted to rock the boat, and the emperor didn’t like itįranz Ferdinand was an ill-tempered, outspoken, headstrong man, said Cohen, and he pressed the emperor to modernize the archaic rules that were slowly killing the empire, as he saw it. Gloves, a symbol of a lady-in-waiting, decorated the bronze of her sarcophagus. The arrangement deeply insulted Ferdinand.Įven in death, Sophie didn’t escape reminders of her ranking. Sophie could not appear at most major events by his side, nor could she be buried in Vienna where the Habsburgs were buried. However, Sophie could gain no royal rank and their children were stripped of all claims to the throne. Photo courtesy of Wikipedia Commonsįranz Ferdinand enlisted the support of the pope, the czar and the kaiser, said Lebow, to twist the emperor’s arm until he agreed. His uncle, Emperor Franz Joseph, deeply resented Franz Ferdinand’s resolve to break this rule.įranz Ferdinand and his wife, Sophie Chotek. His wife was deemed totally unsuitable for the dynastyĬountess Sophie Chotek of Bohemia - a lady-in-waiting when the two met - was just below the level of princess, and according to Habsburg rule, ineligible to marry the archduke. You had to be careful walking down the halls to avoid getting impaled by antlers, said Cohen.Īt the estate, “(t)he foot of a giant elephant, shot by the Archduke in Kalawana in 1893, serves as an ashtray the foot of another such colossus from Ceylon as a wastepaper basket,” wrote a government official from Prague. Hunting trophies - an estimated 100,000 - cluttered his estate at Konopischt. The grand sum of pheasant, partridge and ground game that he shot was 272,511, according to calculations published in “Archduke of Sarajevo.”Įmperor Franz Joseph described his nephew’s hobby as mass murder, said Cohen, while others considered it a mania. ![]() Photo courtesy of Wikipedia Commonsįranz Ferdinand tallied his kills in a massive journal. “I cannot describe my joy,” he wrote of the kill. His personal record was reportedly 2,140 kills in a day.įranz Ferdinand shot his first tiger on a six-week trip to India in 1893. “Anything that moved, he was ready to shoot,” said Lebow. Tigers in India, kangaroos, emus and wallabies in Australia and stag and deer in the forests of Austria all met their demise at the end of the archduke’s rifle. Cohen says that this readiness to dismiss the vulnerable nephew as a viable heir planted in him a seed of resentment toward the Habsburg Imperial Court (one that would grow). ![]() The coterie who surrounded the emperor - his uncle, Franz Joseph - at one time assumed that Franz Ferdinand would not live to inherit the throne. A whirlwind tour of the Mediterranean, a voyage to Asia and a sightseeing cruise down the Nile all helped to dampen the disease until his lungs healed for good in the late 1890s. The upside of weak lungs? He was sent all over the world for treatment. ![]() Many said this was due to his mother, Princess Maria Annunciata, who died of the disease at age 28. He had bad lungsįranz Ferdinand suffered bouts of tuberculosis during his 20s and early 30s. Cohen is a history professor and director of the Center for Austrian Studies at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities Geoffrey Wawro is the author of “A Mad Catastrophe: The Outbreak of World War I and the Collapse of the Habsburg Empire” and Richard Ned Lebow is the author of “Archduke Franz Ferdinand Lives! A World Without World War I.” We also drew from the book “Archduke of Sarajevo: The Romance and Tragedy of Franz Ferdinand of Austria” by Gordon Brook-Shepherd. So who was Franz Ferdinand? We asked three experts who have studied that era. The killing of Archduke Franz Ferdinand would trigger one of the most brutal wars in modern history, eventually pulling in the Russian Empire, Germany, France, Italy, China, the U.S., Japan and beyond into World War I. One month later, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia. One hundred years ago, the heir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian empire and his wife were assassinated by a gunman during a drive through Sarajevo. ![]()
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