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The Much-Maligned Reign of Swedish Queen Maria Eleonora · Ridiculous History

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Speaker 1: back to the show, Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always
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Speaker 1: We just had, Yeah, we just had. Last week, we
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Speaker 1: That was a ton of fun. Uh. It set us
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Speaker 1: up for a history of yodeling podcast through the future.
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Speaker 1: But but but today, Uh, Wild Max is no doubt
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1:30
Speaker 1: kind of a tragic story, like a real weird one. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: so you can always call it ridiculously tragic. Um there's
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Speaker 1: some humor in here every now and again, but buckle
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Speaker 1: up ridiculous stories. Today's story is not the most upbeat
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Speaker 1: one of all time, and it is the story of
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Speaker 1: Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg, who was born on the eleventh
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Speaker 1: of November in Kunnigsberg. Her parents were John sigis Mund,
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Speaker 1: who was the Elector of brandon Burg, and his wife
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Speaker 1: was Anna, the Duchess of Prussia. Their mom had a
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Speaker 1: reputation as being a little bit domineering, let's just say, uh,
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Speaker 1: and she was raised with a strict Lutheran upbringing. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: and this is uh. This is I think one of
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Speaker 1: the first tragedies because often here in two we have
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Speaker 1: these assumptions about members of the aristocracy, and the assumption
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Speaker 1: is that these folks would have much higher than average
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Speaker 1: access to education and that their lives would often be
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Speaker 1: much easier than the lives of the common person. Unfortunately,
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Speaker 1: because of of course, the rank misogyny of the time,
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Speaker 1: this isn't always the case. And so Maria Eleonora, who
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Speaker 1: was a smart person, she didn't have the opportunity to
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Speaker 1: get a lot of formal education because of her mother's
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Speaker 1: kind of dominaring beliefs. Instead, her talents exhibited themselves in
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Speaker 1: things like embroidery or drawing and music. And it's funny
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Speaker 1: because you'll see a lot of historians describing her as
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Speaker 1: quote the most beautiful queen in all of Europe. Uh.
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Speaker 1: You can see more about this on History of Royal
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Speaker 1: Women dot com. But it's weird because there aren't actually
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Speaker 1: a ton of biographies written about her. And you know,
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Speaker 1: when you when you think about it in the larger context,
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Speaker 1: it's possible that she may have been overshadowed by other
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Speaker 1: people in the ruling line, particularly King Gustavus Adolphus and
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Speaker 1: Queen Christina. And we I should mention here that being
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Speaker 1: described as beautiful and these scant biographies is not the
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Speaker 1: same thing as being described as good. People are dunking
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Speaker 1: on her left and right. In the historical record. They
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Speaker 1: called Maria Eleonora what unstable, lavish. Some people have been
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Speaker 1: called her stupid, which I think is unfair. Yeah, it
4:09
Speaker 1: definitely is unfair. Um, you know, and in the trajectory
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Speaker 1: of her life was obviously in most every single way,
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Speaker 1: completely out of her control. So in sixteen sixteen, Gustavus Adolphus,
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Speaker 1: soon to be crowned the King of Sweden. He's twenty
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Speaker 1: two years old at this point. He's looking for um
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Speaker 1: a bride, specifically one of Protestant Um upbringing, and Maria
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Speaker 1: Eleanora kind of fit the bill. He heard wind of
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Speaker 1: all this talk of this beautiful uh seventeen year old princess,
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Speaker 1: and he decided he wanted to, you know, put her
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Speaker 1: on the short list of of potential suitors for him.
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Speaker 1: So this came together pretty quickly. Um he got the
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Speaker 1: blessing of her parents, John Sigismund Uh and Anna, and
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Speaker 1: they got hitched. Maria Eleanora and King Gustavus Adolphus. Marriage
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Speaker 1: was arranged by the court in Sweden and Maria's family
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Speaker 1: over there in Brandenburg. Although it was a little bit
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Speaker 1: controversial on the onset, it wasn't like immediately just like
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Speaker 1: a thumbs up all around. Maria's brother George William, who
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Speaker 1: was the Duke of Prussia, was worried that it was
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Speaker 1: going to cause political tensions between their country and their
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Speaker 1: neighbors in Poland, who controlled a very important strategic piece
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Speaker 1: of land, a coastal strip there in Prussia. So he
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Speaker 1: would have likely preferred, you know, from this geopolitical kind
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Speaker 1: of strategic point of view, that she get hitched with,
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Speaker 1: you know, a royal from Poland, so they would have
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Speaker 1: more easy access to this, uh, this piece of land.
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Speaker 1: But that is not the way it went. No, no,
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Speaker 1: And this might sound a bit strange for people who
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Speaker 1: have not had had a marriage occurring in the sixteenth
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Speaker 1: century um the aristocracy, but the idea of marrying for
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Speaker 1: romantic love took a heck of a back seat to
6:07
Speaker 1: the idea of playing the games of politics. So this actually,
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Speaker 1: these kind of conversations weren't unusual for this time. At
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Speaker 1: one point in fact, Duchess on A wrote a letter
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Speaker 1: to the Queen's mother, the Queen Dowager Christina, and said, look,
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Speaker 1: don't you understand our point of view. We're not so
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Speaker 1: different you and I. We both want to make sure
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Speaker 1: our children have suitable candidates. That you know, who doesn't
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Speaker 1: want their kid to have a good partner in marriage.
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Speaker 1: But Christina, even though she's like I feel you, I
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Speaker 1: feel you, I have a different perspective. She says, I
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Speaker 1: think a union between Brandenburg and Sweden overall can only
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Speaker 1: be a win win, It can only be beneficial. A
6:55
Speaker 1: couple of things happen by six nineteen John Sigismund Eyes.
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Speaker 1: George William is raised a power and his mother, the Duchess,
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Speaker 1: is not vibing with the way this guy resolves political issues.
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Speaker 1: And after four years of negotiation, Gustavus Adolphus is invited
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Speaker 1: to Berlin and in secret he meets with both the
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Speaker 1: Duchess and her daughter. George William is in Prussia at
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Speaker 1: the time and unawares of this. So there's a there's
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Speaker 1: a dinner, and it's classy, it's all above board. There
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Speaker 1: are chaperones and whatnot. And during this time, you know,
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Speaker 1: the King in person proposes to Maria Eleonora and she
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Speaker 1: says yes, so que the romcom sounds, you know, the
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Speaker 1: wedding bells and so on and so on. And the
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Speaker 1: Duchess's son, who had no idea his mom was capable
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Speaker 1: of this level of scheming, is protesting. He's like, hey, no,
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Speaker 1: this is and what we talked about. And so the
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Speaker 1: Duchess responds by smuggling her daughter out of Brandenburg two Mecklenburg,
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Speaker 1: and then a couple of Swedish ships take her away.
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Speaker 1: They take her to Kalmar. They travel for a month
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Speaker 1: at sea, and then Maria Eleanora arrives at Kalmar in
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Speaker 1: October six. The wedding takes place very shortly thereafter in Stockholm.
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Speaker 1: Uh and one of the details we know about it
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Speaker 1: is apparently she was wearing an awesome dress that's like
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Speaker 1: one of the big Definitely it made the it made
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Speaker 1: the front page of all the tabloids of note at
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Speaker 1: the time. Well there the equivalent of that was there
8:42
Speaker 1: had to have been like kind of gossipy publications, you know,
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Speaker 1: kind of like rumor mill type rags, you know what.
8:49
Speaker 1: I like to think I was thinking of this tunnel.
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Speaker 1: I like to think that instead of different newspapers with
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Speaker 1: very levels of credibility, there were different town criers, and
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Speaker 1: like what the tabloid town crier is either just a
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Speaker 1: ruthless liar and malcote or maybe dead drunk all the time.
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Speaker 1: And sometimes the guy's right, and then sometimes it's just
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Speaker 1: stuff he came up with on wet brain. Although I
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Speaker 1: have to say, where royalty was concerned, I would imagine
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Speaker 1: they would take that stuff pretty seriously. They had someone
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Speaker 1: screaming out slanderous you know, lies in the town square,
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Speaker 1: they might come for that dude's head. But you know,
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Speaker 1: like we we often see in these historical matchmaking kind
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Speaker 1: of scenarios, there's a bit of like a kind of
9:33
Speaker 1: learning curve when you adapt to a new culture, especially
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Speaker 1: once you've been like, you know, secretly smuggled at sea.
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Speaker 1: And that was no exception for for Maria. She had
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Speaker 1: a bit of a hard time adapting to her new life. Uh.
9:55
Speaker 1: During the seventeenth century, Stockholm was kind of like in
9:59
Speaker 1: a state of flux. It was always being developed. They
10:03
Speaker 1: were always new buildings being built and you know, things
10:07
Speaker 1: being kind of like worked on at all times. And uh,
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Speaker 1: the court really really wanted to have a capital that
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Speaker 1: was worthy of, you know, the great cities of the world. Uh.
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Speaker 1: And so Maria Eleonora wanted to be a force, you know,
10:23
Speaker 1: to help push that transformation through. And um, she thought
10:27
Speaker 1: that Stockholm was kind of a little bit basic. She
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Speaker 1: thought of it as cold and austere, and you know,
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Speaker 1: felt kind of isolated from all of the other kind
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Speaker 1: of great you know seats of government and power in Europe.
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Speaker 1: Where she came from, in Berlin, which is obviously a
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Speaker 1: really you know, massively cosmopolitan city. This was a real
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Speaker 1: kind of bummer. Um, it was very depressing to her,
10:54
Speaker 1: but she saw the potential, you know, and she had
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Speaker 1: an eye for this kind of stuff apparently, And so
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Speaker 1: she started ordering all of these incredible artisanal craftspeople like
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Speaker 1: goldsmiths and pearl knitters uh and and and you know,
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Speaker 1: fine artists like ballet dancers and musicians to come in
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Speaker 1: from France and Germany uh to help kind of create
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Speaker 1: a cultural uh seat there in Stockholm. And that made
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Speaker 1: her you know, and gave her a reputation as being
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Speaker 1: sort of this patron for the arts within the Swedish
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Speaker 1: court and and also established her as a person of
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Speaker 1: some notable taste m M. And again remember that when
11:33
Speaker 1: her access to formal education was limited, she spent a
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Speaker 1: lot of time learning what we would call the arts.
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Speaker 1: Want to give a shout out real quick to Monique
11:43
Speaker 1: Blocks over their history of royal women as well as
11:47
Speaker 1: Barbara's stepco over at the awesome vintage news. Now we're
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Speaker 1: getting to the uh. Now we're getting to the rough
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Speaker 1: part of the very strange Pixar film. So, like you said,
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Speaker 1: don't she did possess this genuine interest in all things art, right.
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Speaker 1: She also loved architecture. She would draw sketches of churches, palaces.
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Speaker 1: She loved music, She was super into fashion, and she
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Speaker 1: found that the king shared these interests at least to
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Speaker 1: some extent. And low and behold they won the romantic lottery.
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Speaker 1: They actually fell in love with each other. And I know, right,
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Speaker 1: and this didn't always happen with Royal were still in
12:33
Speaker 1: the happy part of the Pixar movie at this point,
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Speaker 1: because that is kind of the twist, right where you
12:38
Speaker 1: have That's so something you'll see in like disneys where
12:40
Speaker 1: you'll see these like kind of couples that are kind
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Speaker 1: of trothed against their will and then ultimately, through through
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Speaker 1: all of the trials and tribulations that they faced, you know,
12:48
Speaker 1: find actual love at the heart of it. So that's
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Speaker 1: kind of where we're at. So things are looking good right, well, see,
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Speaker 1: I think I think what I'm doing is laying the
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Speaker 1: seed for the twist. Because she was so in love
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Speaker 1: with the king that every time he had to be
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Speaker 1: away for a while, which he did because you know,
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Speaker 1: he has to do king king business, she would fall
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Speaker 1: into the depths of dire depression. And this guy was
13:12
Speaker 1: fighting out in the field often, and so she couldn't eat,
13:16
Speaker 1: she couldn't sleep, she was just she's worth aside herself. Yeah,
13:21
Speaker 1: she's worried about him because she loves the guy. And
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Speaker 1: then she has her own job. And this is not
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Speaker 1: something that we look kindly upon in the modern day,
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Speaker 1: but back then, as her position required, she had one big,
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Speaker 1: big job, bigger than all the decoration, bigger than all
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Speaker 1: the patronage of the arts. She had to give the
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Speaker 1: king a son. And this is where we start to
13:47
Speaker 1: get weird. And as we know, uh, you know, like
13:50
Speaker 1: with was it King Henry the eighth who kept having
13:52
Speaker 1: his wife that wouldn't give him the son killed for
13:56
Speaker 1: various trumped up charges. But now we know that of
13:59
Speaker 1: course it is the man side of that love connection,
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Speaker 1: that that that produces the the material needed to generate
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Speaker 1: a male right, yeah exactly. But God forbid you say
14:12
Speaker 1: the king was a fault for anything in general. So yeah, no,
14:17
Speaker 1: you would never. Um. So this is something that's that's
14:19
Speaker 1: that's a lot of pressure. There's a lot of pressure
14:21
Speaker 1: to you know, to produce a male heir. And she
14:26
Speaker 1: clearly got pregnant very quickly after the wedding, because it
14:29
Speaker 1: was eight months after the ceremony that she gave birth
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Speaker 1: to a daughter. Not only was that a bummer for
14:37
Speaker 1: all concerned, um, but but stevens more sadly, the baby
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Speaker 1: was in fact still born. So a couple of years
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Speaker 1: later she got pregnant again, had another daughter, Uh, not
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Speaker 1: looking good. They named her Christina, and she was given
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Speaker 1: the title of the Heiress presumptive, how presumptuous of Sweden,
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Speaker 1: of the Swedish throne. And then she died at eleven months.
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Speaker 1: And then in six Maria gave birth for the third time,
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Speaker 1: and this was boy. It's a boy. Everyone's thrilled, except
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Speaker 1: now the baby was also still born. Yeah, exactly. And
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Speaker 1: this this is a struggle, you know, infant mortality is
15:23
Speaker 1: higher in this time in history, and she's not going
15:28
Speaker 1: to give up. There's a rare pause and battle. In sixteen,
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Speaker 1: Gustavus returns to Stockholm, and then not too long after
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Speaker 1: December seven, Maria Eleanora gives birth for the fourth time.
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Speaker 1: And this, okay, so this made me look kindly on Gustavus.
15:47
Speaker 1: So the baby is born, the baby is healthy, and
15:51
Speaker 1: the baby is thought to be well. The baby's overall healthy.
15:55
Speaker 1: There's nothing, you know, like functionally wrong with the child.
16:00
Speaker 1: But they have something called fleece lanugo, which is a
16:05
Speaker 1: it's a condition where there's this unpigmented, kind of soft,
16:09
Speaker 1: downy hair that covers newborn body. In this instance, the
16:13
Speaker 1: kid was entirely covered from head to knees with just
16:17
Speaker 1: face and I think arms and lower legs visible without
16:21
Speaker 1: the hair. Everybody assumed this was a boy, and then
16:24
Speaker 1: when they looked through the downy hair, they said, oh no,
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Speaker 1: this is a girl. And people are scared that the
16:31
Speaker 1: king is gonna be mad, and they try to hide
16:35
Speaker 1: this truth from him. But unlike Henry, Henry the eighth,
16:39
Speaker 1: Gustavus is kind of cool about it. He even has
16:42
Speaker 1: this line where he says, well, you know, I think
16:44
Speaker 1: she's gonna be quite clever. She took us all in,
16:48
Speaker 1: meaning she told us I thought that was cool dad energy,
16:52
Speaker 1: super cool dad energy c d e H cool dad energy. Yeah,
16:56
Speaker 1: baby coming out looking like a little vomerinable snowman, you know.
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Speaker 1: But it turns out it was an avulnerable snow snow girl.
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Speaker 1: And he decided to name her Christina. This is the
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Speaker 1: second Christina, after the previous one that had passed away,
17:09
Speaker 1: and that's after his mother um and he ordered that
17:12
Speaker 1: her arrival be announced to the court with the same
17:17
Speaker 1: level of fanfare that would have been associated with a
17:20
Speaker 1: male heir. So again, Ben, to your point, pretty progressive,
17:23
Speaker 1: cool guy, but his wife did not seem to share
17:28
Speaker 1: that enthusiasm. Yeah right, that's that's the thing. So okay,
17:35
Speaker 1: here we go. If you were looking back on the
17:41
Speaker 1: actions were about to describe with the benefit of retrospect,
17:45
Speaker 1: you would probably say the queen was suffering from postpartum depression.
17:51
Speaker 1: So the court is already entering the realm of public
17:55
Speaker 1: relations and politics at this point. They hold off on
17:59
Speaker 1: an out seeing that this child is a girl, and
18:04
Speaker 1: when Maria Eleanora learns this, she says, quote instead of
18:10
Speaker 1: a saw, no, I'm giving a daughter dark and ugly
18:13
Speaker 1: with a great nose and black eyes. Take off from me.
18:17
Speaker 1: We'll not have such a monster, which is a terrible
18:20
Speaker 1: thing to say about your child. And then accidents start happening.
18:24
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you know, accidents happened. But also where there's smoke,
18:27
Speaker 1: there's fire. If we're gonna link to um, you know
18:30
Speaker 1: cliches together, Um yeah, like a beam fell and almost
18:34
Speaker 1: came close to like pancaking this baby in its crib
18:38
Speaker 1: where it lay the little girl, Christina actually took a
18:41
Speaker 1: really bad tumble down a flight of stairs. A nursemaid
18:46
Speaker 1: who was it was taking care of her, was blamed
18:49
Speaker 1: for dropping Christina onto a stone floor, and this really happened.
18:53
Speaker 1: It actually resulted in an injury um that caused her
18:57
Speaker 1: to have a malformed shoulder for for the rest of
19:00
Speaker 1: her life, kind of like a crooked like shoulder. Because
19:03
Speaker 1: of course they would not have been able to treat
19:04
Speaker 1: something like that as effectively today. I'm sure they could
19:06
Speaker 1: have you restored it and made it look normal again,
19:09
Speaker 1: but it's something that she carried around for the rest
19:11
Speaker 1: of her life. Uh. Gustavus Adolphus at this point knows
19:15
Speaker 1: something is wrong and not necessarily saying that he knew
19:21
Speaker 1: that she had it in for this baby, but he
19:23
Speaker 1: knew that she was not well and described her as
19:25
Speaker 1: being a very sick woman. This is his wife, Maria,
19:28
Speaker 1: of course, yeah, exactly. And so there are obviously a
19:35
Speaker 1: lot of contextual factors here. We have to remember she
19:38
Speaker 1: had already lost three children. She had for some time
19:42
Speaker 1: felt isolated, you know, she felt like a foreigner in
19:45
Speaker 1: this new land. And this feeling of isolation was only
19:51
Speaker 1: exacerbated in six when her brother joined Sweden's enemies. Her
19:58
Speaker 1: husband was constantly, constantly about to get killed because he
20:03
Speaker 1: was on these military campaigns. That same year six he had,
20:09
Speaker 1: in the space of one year both fallen sick and
20:12
Speaker 1: been pretty grievously wounded. Two years after that, he barely
20:17
Speaker 1: made it out of a place called Stoom without being killed,
20:22
Speaker 1: causing Maria Eleanor to write, when I know that my
20:26
Speaker 1: most beloved Lord is coming, then all my sickness and
20:29
Speaker 1: panic fall away. There's a word that the medical experts
20:34
Speaker 1: of this time used to describe it was cleany. It
20:39
Speaker 1: is hysteria. Unfortunately, and because she was so hysterical, the king,
20:48
Speaker 1: who you know, you're starting We're starting to get the
20:51
Speaker 1: sense maybe he didn't have the same depth of affection. Uh.
20:54
Speaker 1: The King did not allow his spouse to have almost
20:58
Speaker 1: any influence in the upbringing of her own daughter. And
21:02
Speaker 1: he said, we're gonna raise her like a boy, and
21:05
Speaker 1: she she's gonna be in the care of her aunt,
21:08
Speaker 1: and uh, she's gonna go to military reviews. We're gonna
21:12
Speaker 1: teach her how to ride, to shoot, we'll teach her
21:13
Speaker 1: how to hunt. Uh and and so eventually Christina's what
21:19
Speaker 1: you might call it tomboy. She knows a few pretty
21:22
Speaker 1: choice dirty jokes. She curses like a sailor. Um. It's weird.
21:27
Speaker 1: I have a hard time with this one, Max Noel,
21:30
Speaker 1: because for the time a man of his position, this
21:35
Speaker 1: guy seems kind of almost in just even this small instance,
21:40
Speaker 1: he seems almost progressive because he's saying, like, let's not
21:44
Speaker 1: force her to be locked away in some rapunzalesque Ivory
21:48
Speaker 1: Tower teacher life skills. I agree with you on that.
21:52
Speaker 1: I also think that maybe he's experiencing his own kind
21:56
Speaker 1: of hysteria too, or it's like get my male air
22:00
Speaker 1: and my wife is kind of lost it. So I'm
22:01
Speaker 1: just gonna, like, you know, move forward in this in
22:04
Speaker 1: this way and and raise this young woman as a man,
22:09
Speaker 1: which yes, it's progressive, but it's like, is there some
22:12
Speaker 1: something going on there too that's causing him to like
22:14
Speaker 1: almost like have this delusion kind of I wonder. I'm
22:17
Speaker 1: just not sure. It's a good question. And that's a
22:21
Speaker 1: good point about her condition because it appears to deteriorate
22:25
Speaker 1: for a it appears to be cyclical, or it waxes
22:30
Speaker 1: and waynes that's the best way to say it. When
22:32
Speaker 1: the king leaves to fight in the Thirty Years War.
22:35
Speaker 1: Of course, the queen is not feeling very good about it.
22:41
Speaker 1: She's going through it, as they would say in the
22:43
Speaker 1: parlance of our time. She writes a bunch of letters
22:47
Speaker 1: to the Chancellor begging him to let her accompany her
22:51
Speaker 1: husband to Germany. So she moves her entire court to
22:55
Speaker 1: Woolgast Castle and spends most of her days writing correspondence
23:01
Speaker 1: to members of the family. Sometimes in these letters it
23:04
Speaker 1: seems like there's a light at the end of the
23:06
Speaker 1: tunnel because she was allowed to relocate with this guy
23:10
Speaker 1: who's her one true love. And she starts even saying
23:14
Speaker 1: nicer things about her daughters, mainly the people who want
23:18
Speaker 1: to date her daughter or in this case, you know,
23:20
Speaker 1: marry her daughter. And she seems excited about being able
23:23
Speaker 1: to be closer to her husband, maybe spend a little
23:26
Speaker 1: more time with him. And then two years after that
23:33
Speaker 1: November two, in the Battle of lutz In Adolphus is
23:38
Speaker 1: shot in the back dragged by his horse. He manages
23:42
Speaker 1: to get free of the horse for a second, but
23:44
Speaker 1: then he is killed by a gunshot to the head.
23:47
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, and so his body is Embalmed's taken the
23:59
Speaker 1: wool guy. Maria sees his cadaver and she physically clings
24:07
Speaker 1: to her husband's remains. They can't get him back to
24:12
Speaker 1: Sweden because the Baltic Sea is frozen at this time
24:16
Speaker 1: in November and towards the end of the year, and she,
24:21
Speaker 1: like her staff, is starting to worry about her because
24:25
Speaker 1: she's keeping the guy's body around and going and hugging it.
24:30
Speaker 1: This is the This is her worst nightmare. You know,
24:32
Speaker 1: all of these kind of psychological episodes have been brought
24:37
Speaker 1: on by his absence, and she feared for his life,
24:41
Speaker 1: you know, when he was in battle, and this is
24:42
Speaker 1: the thing that she feared worst of all all this time,
24:46
Speaker 1: So it's absolutely triggering. She writes some very heavy, kind
24:49
Speaker 1: of mournful reflections about what's going on here, and it
24:52
Speaker 1: kind of gives you a glimpse into her state of mind.
24:54
Speaker 1: Since we, she says, God pity us, we are so
24:58
Speaker 1: rarely granted the pleasure of enjoying the living presence of
25:01
Speaker 1: His Majesty. Are adored, dearest Master and spouse of blessed memory.
25:05
Speaker 1: It should at least be granted to us to stay
25:08
Speaker 1: near his royal corpse and so draw comfort in our
25:11
Speaker 1: miserable existence. Wow, it's like she's seen the crow. You know.
25:18
Speaker 1: It's super goth, is super super dark. Yeah. So his
25:23
Speaker 1: heart had already been removed to be separately preserved. That
25:29
Speaker 1: was a religious thing, right, It is a common practice. Yeah.
25:33
Speaker 1: And Maria Eleanor keeps that organ with her, not she
25:38
Speaker 1: doesn't just keep it with her all the time. She
25:41
Speaker 1: carries it around with her and when she goes to sleep,
25:45
Speaker 1: she hangs it in a classy container above her bed
25:49
Speaker 1: and she weeps inconsolably for months and months and months
25:54
Speaker 1: u and in. It's not until August of sixty three
26:00
Speaker 1: the King's body is finally able to be transported back
26:03
Speaker 1: to Sweden. And this is where Christina, who is now
26:08
Speaker 1: seven years old, shows up in the procession to the
26:12
Speaker 1: ship to meet her mom. And then later she writes
26:16
Speaker 1: about it, and she says, I embraced the queen my mother.
26:19
Speaker 1: She drowned me with her tears and smothered me in
26:22
Speaker 1: her arms. Dude, Maria, she's doing a bit of a
26:26
Speaker 1: WTF herself, isn't she? It's un Yeah. And Maria Eleanor,
26:34
Speaker 1: as she relocates, she you know, gets her royal suite,
26:39
Speaker 1: gets her bedroom and everything, and she puts her husband's
26:42
Speaker 1: coffin unsealed in her bedroom and it sounds like Maria
26:49
Speaker 1: Eleanor was regularly opening it, gazing upon the corpse and
26:53
Speaker 1: taking her daughter who was her daughter has to deal
26:56
Speaker 1: with the fall out of this. Remember this kid is
26:59
Speaker 1: like seven and years old. Again, Uh, they have to
27:03
Speaker 1: but very sharp, right, very sharp. But she has to.
27:06
Speaker 1: Christina has to be in mourning with her. Her mom
27:10
Speaker 1: basically forces her to do this. So they spend all
27:13
Speaker 1: their time in these rooms that are draped when black
27:16
Speaker 1: and blackout curtains, lit by candles, no ray of light,
27:21
Speaker 1: natural light, sunlight is allowed in. She makes her daughter
27:24
Speaker 1: sleep with her in a bed with the heart of
27:28
Speaker 1: the Father hanging over over them in a golden casket.
27:32
Speaker 1: They're like constantly sermons and and religious statements, and of
27:38
Speaker 1: course the entire time Maria Eleanor is still beset with grief,
27:42
Speaker 1: and she's still weeping u constantly. And the daughter that
27:46
Speaker 1: she once treated so poorly, she now clings to write
27:51
Speaker 1: because in a way it's a living memory of this
27:53
Speaker 1: man she loved. It's a messed up situation. Yeah, it
27:57
Speaker 1: gets kind of more messed up from here if that's
27:59
Speaker 1: at all possible. Uh, let's not forget that. Um. You
28:02
Speaker 1: know this this young woman when she was born, her
28:06
Speaker 1: mother essentially completely rejected her and it was only because
28:09
Speaker 1: of her father, who was now dead, that she was
28:12
Speaker 1: even allowed to thrive at all, you know, and be
28:14
Speaker 1: treated like a human. And now she's having to kind
28:18
Speaker 1: of couch out to her mother's overly dramatic morning And
28:22
Speaker 1: I'm not look, I know when people die that we love. Uh,
28:25
Speaker 1: it's it's it's very hard, um. And a lot of
28:28
Speaker 1: this is also wrapped up in clear mental illness. So
28:30
Speaker 1: not trying to make light or say that like Maria
28:33
Speaker 1: Eleonora's being like extra here or something, but it's a
28:36
Speaker 1: lot when you have someone that is just inconsolable and
28:40
Speaker 1: you are the only one that is able to even
28:42
Speaker 1: attempt to console them, and that can be very taxing,
28:45
Speaker 1: and it can get to a place a level of
28:47
Speaker 1: almost abuse. And I would say that's where we're at here, um,
28:50
Speaker 1: with the seven year old eurol being forced to sleep
28:53
Speaker 1: in the bed with her constantly weeping mother, with the
28:55
Speaker 1: heart of her father hanging over and all of this
28:58
Speaker 1: kind of maccab stuff, And it takes a toll on Christina.
29:02
Speaker 1: OT have to mention that Christina, you know who, who
29:03
Speaker 1: was clearly some insecurity about this malform shoulder condition that
29:08
Speaker 1: she had, again as a result of her mother's um
29:12
Speaker 1: you know, kind of despising her. I guess she wasn't
29:15
Speaker 1: treated with very much care um when she was a kid,
29:19
Speaker 1: and I would argue that probably led to what happened
29:22
Speaker 1: with that. Though we don't necessarily have any evidence that
29:24
Speaker 1: her mother like colluded to have her killed, it certainly
29:27
Speaker 1: seems like there was a lot of a lot of
29:29
Speaker 1: accidents that were happening in and around the court where
29:32
Speaker 1: her mother was in charge. Her mother also keeps this
29:34
Speaker 1: kind of cadre of dwarves and um kind of like
29:39
Speaker 1: you know Jester types, you know who may have had
29:43
Speaker 1: some conditions of their own and what would have been
29:46
Speaker 1: referred to as hunchbacks, the condition where you know, people
29:49
Speaker 1: have like a very big growths kind of on their
29:51
Speaker 1: back and uh walk um in a bent over fashion.
29:55
Speaker 1: She did not like being around these people because it
29:57
Speaker 1: made her kind of even more into care about her
30:00
Speaker 1: own malformation. So she really despised this whole kind of situation.
30:06
Speaker 1: Everything about it was just beyond depressing a maccab and
30:10
Speaker 1: it took a toll on her. She started to get ill.
30:12
Speaker 1: She had a serious ulcer that appeared on her chest
30:16
Speaker 1: and caused her a lot of pain. Uh. It was
30:18
Speaker 1: basically like almost like a boil uh, and it gave
30:21
Speaker 1: her a really bad fever and then all of a
30:23
Speaker 1: sudden it burst um, which is just you know, pretty
30:27
Speaker 1: pretty gross to say the least. And that was probably
30:29
Speaker 1: pretty shocking and did cause her fever to break though,
30:33
Speaker 1: So that was good and she did, she did survive this.
30:37
Speaker 1: The court and the council and you know, the governing
30:41
Speaker 1: structures move on. They're trying to make progress. And so
30:45
Speaker 1: it comes to pass in the summer of sixteen thirty four,
30:49
Speaker 1: the king's bodies finally finally interred, put to rest in
30:54
Speaker 1: the ritter Home Church in Stockholm against the r and
31:00
Speaker 1: opposition of Maria Eleanor, the widow. And so this interment
31:05
Speaker 1: doesn't last long because like the next day, basically Maria
31:11
Speaker 1: Eleanora says, you've got to open the coffin again. She
31:15
Speaker 1: is in a prolonged mental crisis. You can rightly call
31:18
Speaker 1: this a mental crisis. And she starts talking about how
31:21
Speaker 1: much she hates the entire like the idea of Sweden,
31:25
Speaker 1: the rocks, the mountains, the freezing air, she says, all
31:28
Speaker 1: the rest of it. She preserves the memory of her
31:32
Speaker 1: heroic husband and it was heroic, and she kept like
31:36
Speaker 1: she could not move past this. And eventually the Regency
31:40
Speaker 1: Council the people would handle the affairs of state while
31:45
Speaker 1: the Queen Christina is you know, growing into her majority.
31:49
Speaker 1: Eventually the council is like, we have to separate Christina
31:52
Speaker 1: from her mom. Her mom is acting so weird. But
31:57
Speaker 1: Maria protests and and weeps so bitterly that eventually nothing
32:04
Speaker 1: is going to be done. And later Christina says, the
32:09
Speaker 1: dreary ceremonies and all the sad people were way worse
32:12
Speaker 1: for me than my dad's actual death. And uh, everybody said,
32:18
Speaker 1: everybody in the council has said, look, Maria Eleanora cannot
32:23
Speaker 1: have any influence on the decisions of the court while
32:28
Speaker 1: her daughter is still a minor. Part of that is
32:32
Speaker 1: the the idea of her presumably fragile mental state. But
32:37
Speaker 1: the other part was that the Swedish rulers and the
32:42
Speaker 1: Swedish kingmakers, i should say, thought that Maria Eleanora was
32:46
Speaker 1: way too friendly with the Danish, like she might be
32:50
Speaker 1: a threat to the security of Sweden. That's really what
32:54
Speaker 1: they thought, and they might not have been too far off. No, Um,
32:58
Speaker 1: the counselor claim that Maria Eleanor had written a letter
33:02
Speaker 1: to him talking about how there was a Danish envoy
33:04
Speaker 1: that she had a relationship with um who she might
33:07
Speaker 1: be able to kind of help arrange a discussion of
33:12
Speaker 1: marriage between Christina and the Danish Prince Ulric. And because
33:17
Speaker 1: of that, she was regarded as a threat and the
33:21
Speaker 1: court really started like keeping tabs on her. So probably
33:24
Speaker 1: not the smartest thing to have brought up in an
33:26
Speaker 1: official correspondence, you know, since the Danish people were not
33:31
Speaker 1: particularly well liked in this part of the country. Yeah, exactly.
33:34
Speaker 1: And so this, this is not an unreasonable fear on
33:39
Speaker 1: their side, you know what I mean. In sixteen thirty six,
33:43
Speaker 1: as a result of these conversations and concerns, the queen
33:46
Speaker 1: essentially loses parental rights, She loses custody, you could say,
33:51
Speaker 1: she loses access to her daughter, Christina. She's transferred to
33:54
Speaker 1: gripps Holme Castle and at this point in her life
33:58
Speaker 1: she wants she just wants to go back to Brandenburg,
34:02
Speaker 1: but the government won't let her visit. So she says, look,
34:05
Speaker 1: i am going to take agency over my own life
34:09
Speaker 1: and I'm going to get out of here by hook
34:11
Speaker 1: or by crook. So she contacts the guy who's like
34:16
Speaker 1: Sweden's public enemy number one right now, the Danish King
34:20
Speaker 1: Christian the Fourth, and they start negotiating in secret, and
34:24
Speaker 1: so she puts on a disguise in July of sixty
34:27
Speaker 1: and escapes the castle. First she goes to this island
34:32
Speaker 1: called Gotland. Get it because you've got land anyway. And
34:39
Speaker 1: there are two Danish warships. No apologies, Max, there are
34:43
Speaker 1: two Janish warships waiting to abscond with her. Uh. They
34:46
Speaker 1: were supposed to take her to Brandenburg, but said she's
34:49
Speaker 1: talking to the captain. She says, take me to Denmark instead.
34:53
Speaker 1: King Christian, who's not expecting this. He's got a surprise guest,
34:58
Speaker 1: but he gets stuck with her and George Williams, Maria's brother,
35:04
Speaker 1: refuses to receive her, so she has to wait until
35:07
Speaker 1: George William dies in December of that same year to
35:10
Speaker 1: enter Germany. And now the new German elector, the new
35:16
Speaker 1: head decision maker, says Okay, you can stay here, but
35:20
Speaker 1: Sweden has to pay your bills. And Christina by now
35:24
Speaker 1: is a teenager. How stressful is this. You're you're a
35:27
Speaker 1: teenager and you have to negotiate a pension for your mom. Uh.
35:32
Speaker 1: And that's that's what this kid has to do. She's
35:36
Speaker 1: had a hard life by all accounts, honestly. So let's
35:39
Speaker 1: fast forward a little, because I think there's some there's
35:43
Speaker 1: some not terrible things that happened. Sweden is no longer
35:47
Speaker 1: participating in the war. By Christina is now two, and
35:53
Speaker 1: as a result of these things, Mariel Leonora is able
35:56
Speaker 1: to finally go back to Stockholm. She missed her daughter,
36:00
Speaker 1: and Christina at the very least thought, you know, it
36:03
Speaker 1: makes us look bad to have my mom exiled, basically,
36:07
Speaker 1: And so she comes. Maria comes back, and she spends
36:11
Speaker 1: most of her time watching escapades or performances by nights,
36:16
Speaker 1: and then watching balls or attending ballets that are arranged
36:20
Speaker 1: by the court. In sixteen, she goes to her daughter's coronation.
36:26
Speaker 1: Her daughter buys a castle for her close to the
36:29
Speaker 1: royal residence in Stockholm. And I don't think Christina liked
36:36
Speaker 1: being queen. No, I don't think so at all, and
36:38
Speaker 1: and that I was pretty clear from her actions. Four
36:40
Speaker 1: years later, she actually abdicated her throne gave it away
36:44
Speaker 1: to her cousin Charles Gustav. She didn't go into super
36:47
Speaker 1: duper detail about what was behind this decision, but she
36:51
Speaker 1: did offer a few potential explanations. Um She said, whether
36:55
Speaker 1: she believed it to be true or not, that a
36:57
Speaker 1: man was better suited to rule the Swedish army, and
37:01
Speaker 1: that she just needed a break, that she was exhausted.
37:03
Speaker 1: I mean, of course it would be exhausting to fill
37:04
Speaker 1: this kind of role. But she definitely buried the lead
37:08
Speaker 1: in that she had recently converted to Roman Catholicism, which
37:13
Speaker 1: as we know, was absolutely uh for Bowden in absurdly
37:18
Speaker 1: Lutheran Sweden. But she she did have some concerns about
37:22
Speaker 1: how this decision to give up the throne might affect
37:25
Speaker 1: her her money situation, you know, her pocketbook. So Christina
37:30
Speaker 1: and Charles did assure her that um the Queen Dowager
37:36
Speaker 1: would be provided that would be her her name at
37:39
Speaker 1: this point, would be provided for until her death, and
37:43
Speaker 1: that was the case. She died on March eighteenth of
37:45
Speaker 1: sixteen fifty five and was laid to rest in Ritter
37:49
Speaker 1: Home Church, next to her husband Um and two of
37:55
Speaker 1: her children that she had before Christina. Yep, and at
37:59
Speaker 1: the top, where was the former Queen Christina? Well, she
38:05
Speaker 1: was touring across Europe, making waves of her own because
38:09
Speaker 1: she was wearing a man suit, as the quote goes,
38:14
Speaker 1: and here we end on a tragic story, a rain
38:21
Speaker 1: that is much maligned. And you know, I believe, fellow
38:26
Speaker 1: ridiculous historians, that when you look at when you look
38:29
Speaker 1: at the context of Maria Eleanora of brandon Burgh's life,
38:34
Speaker 1: what you see is that in many ways the odds
38:37
Speaker 1: were stacked against her. She dealt with tremendous tragedy, she
38:42
Speaker 1: had often very little agency in her life, and like
38:47
Speaker 1: most people, she just wanted to be happy. So maybe
38:50
Speaker 1: when we talk about the lives of royals from times past,
38:55
Speaker 1: we should all take a little moment to realize that
38:58
Speaker 1: they too are just human beings like everyone else. I
39:03
Speaker 1: think that's an okay takeaway, and I hope you can
39:05
Speaker 1: agree as well. Yeah, so's a bit of a bummer
39:09
Speaker 1: of a story. But I do like the progressive angle.
39:13
Speaker 1: You know, the king ended up kind of being the
39:16
Speaker 1: less of a villain in this story than a king
39:18
Speaker 1: would often be in these situations. So that was kind
39:21
Speaker 1: of neat. It was definitely a twist, but yeah, very
39:23
Speaker 1: unhappy life of this woman. But it would seem that
39:27
Speaker 1: Christina really owned that upbringing that her father gave her,
39:30
Speaker 1: that military kind of upbringing, And you would wonder if
39:33
Speaker 1: this is a character that is uh, someone to look
39:36
Speaker 1: towards in terms of gender fluidity and things like that.
39:40
Speaker 1: It's it's a very interesting time for this to be
39:42
Speaker 1: something so out front, right, to wear the suit and
39:45
Speaker 1: all of that, and to really lean into that role.
39:48
Speaker 1: So I don't know, I want to I want to
39:49
Speaker 1: learn more about Christina honestly, man, amazing. She is remembered
39:54
Speaker 1: as one of the most well educated women of the
39:58
Speaker 1: entirety of the seventeenth Tree. She knew about religion, philosophy, math, alchemy,
40:05
Speaker 1: she loved reading. I mean, yeah, she hung out with
40:10
Speaker 1: five popes. It's just another fact we can throw out there.
40:13
Speaker 1: If you would like to like to learn more, let
40:16
Speaker 1: us know, and maybe we can dive into the ups
40:20
Speaker 1: and downs of her life because she has adventures all
40:24
Speaker 1: her own, way past her mother. Uh that's it for
40:26
Speaker 1: us today. Thank you so much as always to the
40:30
Speaker 1: one and only Mr Max Williams first of his name. Also,
40:34
Speaker 1: we want to shout out Mr Alex Williams who composed
40:37
Speaker 1: this slamming track and uh our old nemesses Jonathan Strickland
40:42
Speaker 1: ak the Quister. He loves a Royalty episode Upstairs Downstairs story,
40:49
Speaker 1: no question about it. Uh and Ben, thanks to you
40:51
Speaker 1: um for the for the emotional support and comfort as
40:56
Speaker 1: we trudged our way through this somewhat bummer of a story.
40:59
Speaker 1: That catch you man. We'll see you next time, folks.
41:09
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from My Heart Radio, visit the I
41:11
Speaker 1: Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to
41:14
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