Kinlight · The House of Habsburg

Archduke Maximilian Francis of Austria

1756 – 1801 · Generation XVII · Archbishop-Elector of Cologne · Habsburg-Lorraine

Portrait of Archduke Maximilian Francis of Austria

Maximilian Francis (1756 – 1801). Archbishop-Elector of Cologne. Youngest child of Maria Theresa; cleric, never married. Born in the Hofburg on his father’s forty-eighth birthday, he followed his uncle Charles Alexander of Lorraine as Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights in 1780, and in 1784 became Archbishop-Elector of Cologne and Bishop of Münster, holding court at Bonn. Drawn to Enlightenment ideals, he pursued reforms, and as the empire’s arch-chancellor for Italy he crowned his brother Leopold II in 1790 and his nephew Francis II in 1792. Music mattered greatly to him, and he recognised the gifts of the young Beethoven; he gave him leave to study with Mozart in Vienna in 1787 and later sent him there on full salary to study with Haydn. French revolutionary armies overran Cologne and Bonn in 1794, and he fled, never to return; his lands on the Rhine’s left bank passed to France. Corpulent and in poor health, he settled in Vienna and died at Hetzendorf Palace in 1801.

Place in the family

  • Archduke Maximilian Francis of Austria was a son of Maria Theresa.
  • Archduke Maximilian Francis of Austria was the youngest of 9 children of Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor and Maria Theresa recorded in this archive.

One of 24 people of Habsburg-Lorraine (from 1736) in this archive. Maria Theresa’s marriage carried the inheritance into a new name, which its heirs still bear.

Line of descent: Rudolf I of Germany → Albert I of Germany → Albert II, Duke of Austria → Leopold III, Duke of Austria → Ernest, Duke of Austria → Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor → Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor → Philip I of Castile → Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor → Charles II, Archduke of Austria → Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor → Ferdinand III, Holy Roman Emperor → Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor → Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor → Maria Theresa → Archduke Maximilian Francis of Austria.

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