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Table of Contents Pictures 3 Birth Date and Birth Place 4 Early Life 4 Schooling 4 Family 4 Accomplishments 4 Hardships 5 Later Life and Death 5 Bibliography 6 Pictures Birth Date and Birth Place Maria Theresa, the eldest daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI and Elizabeth Brunswick-Wolfenbttel, was born in Vienna on May 13, 1717. Early Life When the only son of Charles VI died and left no heir to the throne, Charles furthered the Pragmatic Sanction. The Pragmatic Sanction is a royal act, which allowed a female to inherit the territories of the Habsburg. In 1736 Maria Theresa married Francis Stephen of Lorraine. The marriage of Maria to Francis was one of love, which was very unlike many in that time. The French strongly opposed the marriage of Lorraine lands to the Habsburg lands and demanded that he give up his ancestral rights of Lorraine for the succession of Tuscany.
Schooling Maria Theresa did not have much schooling in politics, so when her father died on October 17, 1740, she was ill prepared. She had never had book-learned education and was only taught the proper etiquette and court manners that the ladies of her time learned. Family Maria Theresa and Francis Stephen had sixteen children, only ten of them survived. Maria loved her children very much, even though they were rebellious and often irritated her greatly. After they moved away she still kept in tight correspondence, and gave them wise advise. Her children became famous well-known people such as, the later Emperors Joseph II, Leopold II, and the later queen of France, Marie-Antoinette.
Maria's favorite out of all her many children was Maria Christina, who was the only one allowed to marry for love to Prince Albert of Saxony-Teschen, and was showered with vast gifts of money. Accomplishments Maria Theresa Accomplished many things during her reign, she established a strong army, centralized the administration of the government, and initiated reforms in agriculture and education. She approved drastic changes in universities, such as the introduction of textbooks. She also managed to hook the University of Vienna's medical school with the public Health service. She tried to improve the lives of the peasants and put an end to the cruelty of the landlords, she tried to abolish serfdom in Bohemia but met opposition from her husband who was getting complaints from the lord-holders.
Hardships After Charles VI died, the war he had tried so hard to prevent broke out after Maria inherited the throne. Besides having to deal with the war, Maria found that Charles had left the Habsburg territories in a dire state of disrepair, along with an empty treasury. The war of the Austrian Succession involved the allied European princes of Bavaria, France, Prussia, Saxony, and Spain against her country, and her allies the British and the Dutch. At the beginning of the war Maria lost her precious Silesia to the prince of Prussia, Frederick II. Maria was so determined to regain the territory of Silesia that she abandoned her alliance with Great Britain and allied herself with France and Russia. At that time Britain and France were great enemies and her alliance with them angered Britain so much that they allied against her with Prussia and the other countries.
This action is known as the Reversal of Alliances. Although this new alliance did not help out Austria or France, Maria lost no more of her Austrian land. Within seven years, between 1756 to 1763, the treasury had been drained of all the money Maria had worked so hard to regain. After her fathers death Charles Albert of Bavaria, a sworn enemy and one allied against her in the war for the Habsburg territories, was elected the new Holy Roman Emperor on January 24, 1742. Maria Theresa was mortified. After he died in 1745 she secured the crown for her husband since woman were not allowed the position at the time.
He later became Francis I of the Holy Roman Empire. Later Life and Death After her husband suddenly died in 1765, her son Joseph II became the new emperor. Even though Joseph was the new emperor, she still held much power and experienced many disappointments with him. He was continuously pressing new age ideas on her and it intensely frightened her. She urged him to continue with the old ways but he refused. Maria Theresa died in Vienna on November 29, 1780.
She was undoubtedly one of the worlds greatest rulers. Bibliography web web web web web
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