Princess Mathilde of Saxony (born 1863)

Princess Mathilde of Saxony, Duchess of Saxony (19 March 1863 – 27 March 1933) was the third child and third-eldest daughter of George of Saxony and his wife, Maria Anna of Portugal. She was an elder sister of the Kingdom of Saxony's last king, Frederick Augustus III of Saxony.

For the daughter of Friedrich Christian, Margrave of Meissen, and wife of John Henry of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, see Princess Mathilde of Saxony (born 1936).
Princess Mathilde
Duchess of Saxony
Born(1863-03-19)19 March 1863
Dresden, Saxony
Died27 March 1933(1933-03-27) (aged 70)
Dresden, Saxony, Germany
Burial
Katholische Hofkirche, Dresden, Germany
Full name
German: Prinzessin Mathilde Marie Auguste Viktorie Leopoldine Karoline Luise Franziska Josepha von Sachsen, Herzogin zu Sachsen
HouseWettin
FatherGeorge of Saxony
MotherMaria Anna of Portugal
ReligionRoman Catholic

Life

As a young girl, Mathilde was quiet and gentle, but she was not especially good-looking. Her father, George of Saxony, had planned a marriage between Mathilde and Archduke Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria, Hungary, and Bohemia, however Rudolf rejected this arrangement and instead married Princess Stéphanie of Belgium.

It was then agreed that Mathilde would marry a nephew of Emperor Franz Joseph I and the presumptive heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand. However, Franz Ferdinand rejected this arrangement. Dynastic relations between the Saxon royal family and the Habsburgs were once again strained when Franz Ferdinand chose to marry (morganatically) Sophie Chotek, Countess Chotek of Wognin. (Relations between the two nations improved only when Mathilde's younger sister Maria Josepha married her second cousin, Archduke Otto Francis.)

Mathilde became embittered by these rejections and turned critical and waspish; she also turned to alcohol to ease her unhappiness, acquiring the nickname "Schnapps-Mathilde" for obvious reasons. She made life difficult for other members of the royal family, and as a consequence was the least popular of the family by a wide margin among the people of Saxony.

She was a talented painter and took lessons from the artist Alfred Diethe from 1890 to 1901. Some of her paintings, mainly landscapes and scenes of court life in Pillnitz, were made into prints. Others appeared on postcards, which were sold to raise money for charity.

Mathilde died unmarried on 27 March 1933 at the age of 70. She was interred in the New Tomb of the Katholische Hofkirche in Dresden.

Titles and styles
  • 19 March 1863 – 27 March 1933: Her Royal Highness Princess Mathilde of Saxony, Duchess of Saxony

Ancestry
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References
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