Empress Zita

She was the last Empress and Queen consort of Austria-Hungary (1916-1918), as the wife of Charles I of Austria and IV of Hungary. Among her closest ancestors there were several kings of the ruling houses of Spain, Portugal and France. Daughter number seventeen of Duke Robert I of Parma, Zita married Archduke Charles of Habsburg in 1911. Charles became heir to Emperor Franz Joseph I in 1914 after the murder of his uncle Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, and took the throne in 1916, following the death of the Emperor. After World War I, in 1918, the Habsburgs were deposed with the split of Austria – Hungary. Carlos and Zita left for exile in Switzerland- only for some years- and then the Portuguese island of Madeira, where Carlos died in 1922. Then, the widowed empress moved to Spain. After a brief visit to Madrid, she settled in the Biscayan town of Lekeitio. Zita’s family arrived in Lekeitio on August 18, 1922: Archduchess Maria Teresa, Zita’s mother, Archduke Otto, and five of her brothers. The empress and her two youngest children, the last one 9 months old, arrived on the 22nd of the same month. Otto’s brothers were called Adelaida, Roberto, Félix, Carlos Ludovico, Rodolfo, Carlota and Isabel. Several years went by in Lekeitio until the monarchical institution was overthrown in 1931 and King Alfonso XIII left for exile. For this same reason, the empress and her family chose to leave Lekeitio.