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| Władysław (9 June 1595 – 20 May 1648), reigned 1632–1648 as Władysław IV Vasa, King of Poland. |
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| Anna Maria (23 May 1593 – 9 February 1600). |
Sigismund III had twelve children by two wives. His first wife, Anna of Austria, gave birth to five children, three of whom didn't survive their first year, and the fourth died before her seventh birthday. With only one surviving heir, seven years after Anna's death, Sigismund married her sister, Constance, and had seven more children. Of these, two died before their first birthday, while two more had barely attained adulthood before their premature deaths.
These are portraits of two of the first three children born to Sigismund and Anna, his first wife; the second child, Katarzyna, died before she was a month old. The first-born, Anna Maria, three years old in this portrait, would die before she turned seven. But her brother, two years younger, would live to succeed their father and reign as Władysław IV Vasa.
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| The parents of the children, by the same artist: Anna of Austria, circa 1595. |
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| Sigismund III, circa 1590. |
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Martin Kober (circa 1550, Wrocław – before 1598, Kraków or Warsaw), portrait painter and court painter to several Central European monarchs, mainly active in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.
Yes they looked very cute and elegantly dressed. But noone knew which child would live and which would die in childhood. Each one had to be groomed, educated and prepared for their royal roles in adulthood.
ReplyDeleteYet if Sigismund III had twelve children by two wives, he had a really tragic family history - of the five children of the first family, four died early :( Even when Sigismund married his sister-in-law and had seven more children, 4 died before they could take up their royal roles :(
Wealth and privilege clearly didn't protect his children.
The "good old days" weren't very good for little children, poor things.... : (
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