Anna of Austria (1573–1598)

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• Anna_von_Österreich_(1573–1598)
• Ana_de_Habsburgo,_reina_de_Polonia_y_Suecia
• Anne_d'Autriche_(1573-1598)
• Anna_d'Asburgo_(1573-1598)
• Anna_van_Oostenrijk_(1573-1598)
• アンナ・フォン・エスターライヒ_(1573-1598)
• Anna_Habsburżanka_(1573-1598)
• Ana_de_Áustria_(rainha_da_Polónia_e_da_Suécia)
• Anna_av_Steiermark
• 奥地利的安娜_(1573年-1598年)

Anna of Austria
Queen consort of Poland
Tenure	18 September 1592 – 19 April 1598
Coronation	31 May 1592 Wawel Cathedral, Kraków
Queen consort of Sweden
Tenure	17 November 1592 – 24 July 1598
Coronation	1 March 1594
Spouse	Sigismund III Vasa
among others... Issue
Władysław IV Vasa
House	House of Habsburg
Father	Charles II, Archduke of Austria
Mother	Maria Anna of Bavaria
Born	16 August 1573 Graz, Austria
Died	10 February 1598 (aged 24) Warsaw, Poland
Burial	Wawel Cathedral, Kraków, Poland

Anna of Austria, or Anna of Habsburg also Anne (Polish:Anna Austriaczka,^[1] Anna Habsburżanka, Anna Rakuszanka) (Graz 16 August 1573 - Warsaw 10 February 1598) was an Archduchess of Austria and Queen of Poland and Sweden.

Biography

Anna was a daughter of Charles II of Austria and Maria Anna of Bavaria. Her paternal grandparents were Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor and Anne of Bohemia (1503–1547), daughter of King Ladislaus II of Bohemia and Hungary and his wife Anne de Foix. Her maternal grandparents were Albert V, Duke of Bavaria and Anna of Austria.

She was also a younger sister of Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor, Margaret of Austria, Leopold V of Austria and an older sister of Constance of Austria.

Anna became the first wife of Sigismund of Poland and Sweden on 31 May 1592. This marriage was opposed by many nobles (szlachta) of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, who were opposed to the alliance with the Habsburgs that Sigismund pursued.

When Sigismund sent a diplomatic mission, lead by Cardinal Radziwill, to Prague for his bride, the anti-Habsburg party with chancellor Jan Zamoyski guarded the borders to prevent the Archprincess from entering the country. Anna evaded the guards, arrived in Kraków and was crowned in May 1592 by Primas Karnkowski as the Queen of Poland and two years later, in 1594, in Sweden, as the Queen of Sweden. During her stay in Sweden, she became involved in a conflict with Dowager Queen Gunilla Bielke.

She and Sigismund fell in love and Anna gained the friendship and respect of many of her former enemies with her politeness and culture. It was during her lifetime that Sigismund moved the capital of the Commonwealth from Kraków to Warsaw.

Issue

They had five children, but only Wladislaw lived to become an adult:

1. Anna Maria (23 May 1593 – 9 February 1600)
2. Catherine (19 April 1594 – 16 May 1594)
3. Vladislaus (9 June 1595 – 20 May 1648), (reigned 1632-1648 as Władysław IV Waza of Poland)
4. Catherine (27 September 1596 – 2 June 1597)
5. Christopher (10 February 1598 – 10 February 1598)

Anna died on 10 February 1598 and Sigismund III then married her sister Constance Renate of Habsburg.

Ancestors

Gallery

Anna of Austria in Spanish dress (saya), portraited by Polish court painter Marcin Kober in the 1590s.

Vasa Gate at the Wawel built in 1595 by king Sigismund III to commemorate the birth of his heir.

Her coffin in the Sigismund's Crypt under the Wawel Cathedral (second from the left).

Notes

1. ^ Anna Austriaczka is more often used for the Anne of Austria, wife of Louis XIII of France.

Succession

Further reading

• Europe in the sixteenth-century, Andrew Pettegree, 2002, ISBN 063120704X
• (Swedish) Den svenska historien. 4. Gustav Vasa. Riket formas (The History of Sweden. 4. Gustav Vasa. The empire is formed), Gunvor Grenholm, Jan Cornell, Jerker Rosén, Sten Carlsson and Svenolov Ehrén, 1978, ISBN 9100426679

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