![]() Austria also benefited from the wealth produced by those provinces’ industries. As a result, the affected territories lent Austria’s weakened army significantly more military power. He assigned Bohemia and Austria to a joint ministry and took power away from the Provincial Estates. Haugwitz’s reform effort focused mainly on the centralization of the empire’s power. ![]() Once the war had ended, Maria Theresa set about further reforming the Habsburg government, with Silesian exile Count Frederick William Haugwitz heading up the effort. She also to struggled to find capable men to align themselves with the Habsburg Empire, with the exception of a few administrators she had managed to appoint. Reforming Domestic Policyĭuring the War of the Austrian Succession, Maria Theresa had never found an adequate general. ![]() The war ended in 1748 when Austria was forced to let Prussia keep Silesia and to accept the loss of three of its Italian territories to France. Bavaria and France followed suit with their own invasion of Habsburg territories, resulting in an eight-year conflict dubbed the War of the Austrian Succession. Under the leadership of Frederick II, King of Prussia, those powers formed a coalition against Maria Theresa.īy December of that year, Frederick II’s army invaded Silesia, an Austrian province, and claimed it for his kingdom. But Maria Theresa immediately faced resistance to her succession from European powers who had previously agreed to her father’s Pragmatic Sanction. Subjects of her crown lands - the Austrian duchies and Netherlands, and Bohemia and Hungary - were quick to accept Maria Theresa as their empress. It was time for Maria Theresa, then 23 years old, to succeed to the Habsburg throne. Her 16 children consisted of 5 sons and 11 daughters, including the future queen of France, Marie Antoinette. Over the course of her marriage, Maria Theresa would give birth to a sizable brood. Since Lorraine could potentially be incorporated into the Habsburg Empire, Duke Francis appeased France by conceding to trade his province for Tuscany, which was of considerably lesser value. In 1736 Maria Theresa and her beloved Duke Francis Stephen of Lorraine, France, were wed. Instead, Charles VI allowed his daughter to marry for love. Marriage and ChildrenĬharles VI had been encouraged by his trusted adviser, Prince Eugene of Savoy, to marry Maria Theresa off to a powerful prince. Despite the fact that Maria Theresa, who indeed still did not have a brother, was increasingly likely to inherit the Habsburg throne, she was ill-acquainted with affairs of state. Her studies focused on frivolous skills thought to befit a young noblewoman. Maria Theresa’s education and upbringing were typical of princesses at the time. Over time, they begrudgingly agreed to honor the sanction. In 1720 Charles worked tirelessly to earn support for the sanction from his crown lands and several of the great European powers. In 1713 he issued the Pragmatic Sanction to ensure his eldest daughter’s right to take over the throne when he died, provided he never had a son. Maria Theresa’s father was the last remaining male heir to the Habsburg throne, so before she was born, fearing that he might not produce a son, Charles VI reformed the Salic Law, which prevented any female heir from succeeding her father. She was born at the Hofburg Palace in Vienna, Austria. Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI and his wife, Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, welcomed their first daughter, Maria Theresa, into the world on May 13, 1717. She died on November 29, 1780, in Vienna, Austria. In 1765 she appointed her son her co-regent. In 1756 Frederick II waged the Seven Years' War against her. The war ended in 1748, after which she reformed her government and military. In resistance, Frederick II’s army invaded and claimed Silesia. In 1740, Maria Theresa succeeded the Habsburg throne. ![]()
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