Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg

Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg (* November 11, 1599 in Königsberg, † March 28, 1655 in Stockholm) was a princess of Brandenburg and by marriage Queen of Sweden.

Life

Princess of Brandenburg

Maria Eleonora was a daughter of the Elector Johann Sigismund of Brandenburg (1572-1619) from his marriage to Anna (1576-1625), daughter of Duke Albrecht Friedrich of Prussia. The princess was brought up by her mother in the Lutheran faith, though her ​​father had accepted the reformed faith. Maria Eleonora had her future husband in 1618 met in Berlin, where he was staying as a colonel Gars incognito in order to inspect it. Maria Eleonora's mother Anna pushed ahead with the marriage project while it was feared the approach of Brandenburg and Sweden in the Catholic camp. King Sigismund III. Poland therefore also asked for his son Wladyslaw for the hand of the princess. Although Elector Johann Sigismund was this plan very fond, his wife Anna continued finally.

At the top of the Swedish legation, who had come with eight ships from Sweden and should end the marriage contract, was Chancellor Axel Oxenstierna. This worked because of the skepticism Johann Sigismund yielding and rapid conclusion of the contract.

Queen of Sweden

On November 25, 1620 married in Stockholm, King Gustav II Adolf of Sweden ( 1594-1632 ). On 28 November, she was anointed and crowned Queen of Sweden. The marriage was happy. Gustav Adolf loved his wife and they accompanied him on his campaigns after they had landed in 1631 at the head of a military association of 8,000 men to reinforce in Pomerania. However, he did not participate his superficial wife to the government. The Queen was described as moody, intellectually gifted and little temperamental. Her love for music, painting and architecture made ​​them prone to waste and made considerable debt. In Sweden, the queen herself was not very popular there because of their acting as strange splendor and its preference for foreigners. Gustavus Adolphus, the Lion of the North, fell in 1632 at the Battle of Lützen.

Queen dowager

Maria Eleonora was deeply affected by the death of her husband. Soon rumors spread: The coffin accompanied Maria Eleonora of Lützen to Sweden had to remain always in their vicinity; the left in a gold box embalmed heart of King was hung above her bed every night in Stockholm and she tried the final burial of Gustavus Adolphus constantly defer. However, this work incorporated in the historiography image of the hysterical, depressive and lavish Queen Dowager was put into perspective by recent research, for the first time in the 1980s, among others, by Empire archivist Åke Kromnov, most recently in the 2010 monograph published Drottningen som sa nej of Moa Matthis. Thus, this is due in large part to the propaganda activities of the Swedish nobility representing Imperial Council, who wanted to prevent the usually significant participation of Dowager Queen at the regency. This strategy was successful: It actually started with Gustav Adolf's death an era of de facto rule of the aristocracy, above all the Oxenstierna family, which was only offered by the reductions at the end of the 17th century halt.

Maria Eleonora's six year old daughter Christina was in 1632, after the death of Gustavus Adolphus, officially Queen of Sweden and Axel Oxenstierna took over the government. Maria Eleonora, who learned the news of the death of her husband during their stay in Erfurt returned immediately back to Sweden. Here they quickly fell because of the guardianship and education of the Queen in contradiction to Oxenstierna. She retired on her widow's residence Gripsholm Castle, where her Oxenstierna said to have stated that they have no more freedoms than other noble Swedish widows. Your correspondence with relatives in the Empire, notably the Saxon Electress Magdalena Sibylla was monitored and Maria Eleonora complained that they treat like a Konspirantin.

In 1640, she finally made ​​the decision to leave Sweden secretly. She fled under adventurous circumstances and with the consent of the Danish King Christian IV first to Gotland, where she arrived on 24 July 1640 and was greeted with cannon fire. At Schloss Gripsholm you noticed the flight of the queen after seven days and notified those after another four days. Maria Eleonora later lived at the royal Danish court in Nykøbing.

On December 24, 1642 an agreement was made that Maria Eleonora had to leave Denmark. She took in the summer of 1643 apartment in Insterburg and got on her jointure annually paid 40,000 Swedish crowns, which sum her daughter rose again from its own resources. The Queen Dowager often stayed at the court of the Elector of Brandenburg at Königsberg, and lamented the unreliable payment of Swedish funds. After the government takeover of their daughter in 1644 sat down with her mother in this connection, to promote Swedish- Brandenburg marriage project.

In the summer of 1648 Maria Eleonora finally returned to Stockholm. His final years were spent in a reconciled relationship with her ​​daughter and died shortly after their abdication. She was buried in the Riddarholmskyrkan.

Progeny

From their marriage, Maria Eleonora had the following children:

• Daughter ( * / † 1621)
• Christina (1623-1624)
• Son (* / † 1625)
• Christina (1626-1689), Queen of Sweden