Origins During the 18th century, the unhappy marriage between the last male heir of the
House of Este, the future
Duke of Modena and Reggio,
Ercole III, and the sovereign
Duchess of Massa and Carrara,
Maria Teresa Cybo-Malaspina, produced only one surviving child,
Maria Beatrice. However, the
Salic law excluded her, as a woman, from the succession to her father, while she was entitled to succeed her mother since it was derogated in the Duchy of Massa and Carrara by virtue of a 1529 decree of the Emperor
Charles V. When it became obvious that the princely couple would not produce a large offspring, the reigning Duke,
Francis III, set out to prevent Modena from suffering the same fate as Ferrara almost two centuries earlier, simply being reincorporated into the
Empire as a vacant imperial fief. Thus, in 1753, two simultaneous treaties (one public and one secret) were concluded between the House of Este and the
House of Austria, by which the
Archduke Leopold, Empress
Maria Theresa's ninth-born child and third son, and Maria Beatrice were engaged, and the former was designated by Francis III as heir for the imperial investiture as Duke of Modena and Reggio in the event of extinction of the Este male line. In the meantime, Francis would cover the office of governor of Milan ad interim, which was destined for the archduke. and learn Italian, and that the House of Austria-Este never be reabsorbed into the mother House of Austria, passing if necessary to a new cadet branch of the latter. Since Franz Ferdinand was the heir apparent of
Archduke Karl Ludwig, younger brother to then Emperor
Franz Joseph, such testamentary provisions turned Austria-Este into a sort of "
secundogeniture" title within the Austrian imperial family. In the event that Franz Ferdinand and the House of Habsburg-Lorraine refused his terms, Francis stipulated that his entire inheritance would revert to his closest male relatives, his nephews of Bourbon-Spain,
Carlos Maria and
Alfonso Carlos, sons of his sister
Maria Beatrix, who had been raised in the Modena court during their childhood. and legal heir, and now also heir to the throne,
Archduke Charles: the issue of secundogeniture was evidently put aside for the time being, awaiting a possible enlargement of the young Archduke's progeny, which at the time was limited to just one son. Upon Franz Joseph's death in 1916, Archduke Charles ascended to the imperial throne with the name Charles I, and, on 16 April 1917, as head of the House of Habsburg, he issued
letters patent conferring the name, arms and patrimony of Austria-Este on his second son, born meanwhile in 1915,
Archduke Robert and his future issue according to masculine
primogeniture. Through his mother
Zita of Bourbon-Parma (she was a great-granddaughter of, as mentioned above, Maria Teresa of Savoy), Robert coincidentally descended from Maria Beatrice of Este, and thus the blood of Este family was also reunited with the name Austria-Este.
Post-World Wars Archduke Robert's eldest daughter, Maria Beatrice, married Count Riprand of Arco-Zinneberg, a great-grandson on the mother's side of
Maria Theresa, Queen of Bavaria, granddaughter of the duke Francis IV, as well as a descendant on the father's side of the latter's sister, Archduchess
Maria Leopoldine, Countes of Arco and former
Electress consort of Bavaria. On Robert's death his eldest son,
Archduke Lorenz, born 1955, by his wife,
Princess Margherita of Savoy, succeeded him in that role. He is married to
Princess Astrid of Belgium, a daughter of King
Albert II of Belgium. Since the throne of
Belgium is heritable by females (and males no longer have precedence over females), Princess Astrid is an heir of Belgium immediately after the issue of King
Philippe of Belgium. As such, her husband Archduke Lorenz of Austria-Este, was in 1995 elevated to the additional title of
Prince of Belgium. The children of the couple are, since 1991, titled Archduke (Archduchess) of Austria and Prince(ss) of Belgium. The eldest of these is
Prince Amedeo of Belgium, Archduke of Austria, born 1986. == Family Tree ==