4 October – A pious eccentric

Empress Anna of Tyrol was born on 4 October 1585. Her father, Archduke Ferdinand II of Further Austria — the second son of Emperor Ferdinand I and therefore the younger brother of Emperor Maximilian II — had quite a history. In his youth, he secretly married a bourgeois woman with whom he enjoyed a happy life and fathered two sons.

Only after his wife’s death, and in the interests of the dynasty, did Ferdinand remarry his niece Anna Caterina Gonzaga, who bore him three daughters, including Anna. Owing to their parents’ close kinship, the sisters suffered from fragile health. Their mother kept them on a special diet and, during her frequent pilgrimages, left them caringly at home in Innsbruck. Considering Anna Caterina’s piety, the girls’ condition must indeed have been delicate.

Their Catholic faith, however, was strong beyond measure — and that is what makes descriptions of the sisters’ childhood and upbringing rather shiver-inducing. In terms of art and music, they were raised in the spirit of the Renaissance; however, their religious devotion was nearly fanatical and somewhat eerie. I cannot help but wonder whether that strict religious regime was intended to expiate their father’s youthful sins…

In 1611, Emperor Rudolf and his brother Matthias, both lifelong bachelors in their fifties, considered Anna, their 26-year-old first cousin, as a potential wife for one of them. Rudolf soon abandoned the idea, and Anna married Matthias, who became emperor only a few months later.