L a - b e a u t é - s a u v e r a - l e - m o n d e ~ D o s t o ï e v s k i

L a - b e a u t é - s a u v e r a - l e - m o n d e  ~  D o s t o ï e v s k i



Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Maria of Austria, by Anthonis Mor



Maria of Austria, Holy Roman Empress (21 June 1528, Madrid – 26 February 1603, Madrid), Queen Consort of Germany, Bohemia and Hungary, spouse of Maximilian II, Holy Roman Emperor. She was the daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and his wife, Isabella of Portugal. In 1648, Maria married her first cousin Maximilian and bore him sixteen children, ten of whom survived infancy. Extremely pious, she wielded much political influence and twice served as regent of Spain, first for her father and, later, her brother King Philip II. In 1582, after the death of her husband, she returned to Spain and installed herself in the Convent of Las Descalzas Reales, where she lived until her death at the age of seventy-four.

(The Habsburg dynasty, the various royal titles it held, and its succession are exceedingly complicated. I'm not even going to try and explain it further; much of the above is confusing enough.)

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Anthonis Mor (circa 1516-20, Utrecht - circa 1576, probably Antwerp), Netherlandish portrait painter, very popular in the European royal courts of his day, especially those ruled by the Habsburg dynasty. Known variously as Antonis, Antoon, or Anthonius Mor, and as Anthonis Mor van Dashorst, Antonio Moro, Anthony More, etc., his signed most of his work as Anthonis Mor. Copies were regularly made of his portraits, and other artists worked to copy his style, including his student Alonso Sánchez Coello, so attribution of his work can sometimes be a challenge.




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