Anna of Great Britain, Ireland and Hanover
Princess Anne, Princess Royal and Princess of Orange (born November 2, 1709 in Herrenhausen ; † January 12, 1759 in The Hague ) was the second child and eldest daughter of the British King and Brunswick Elector Georg II and his wife Caroline von Ansbach . She was the wife of the first inheritance holder in the Netherlands, Wilhelm IV.
Anne was the second holder of the title Princess Royal , which can be bestowed on the eldest daughters of a British monarch, and Prince Regent of Friesland .
youth
Anne of Hanover was five years old when her grandfather, Elector Georg Ludwig, ascended the British throne as Georg I. It then became the custom for the legitimate children and grandchildren in the male line of a British monarch to bear the title of Prince or Princess of Great Britain and Ireland and to be dubbed Royal Highness . Great-grandchildren in the male line carried the predicate Highness . Anne's father ascended the throne on June 11, 1727.
Princess Royal
On August 30, 1727, her father George II named her Princess Royal as his eldest daughter . Charles I was the first to give this title to his daughter Maria Henrietta in 1642 . After that the title was no longer used. Anne became Princess Royal during the lifetime of her aunt, Queen Sophie Dorothea of Prussia , who would also have been eligible for this honorary title, but did not receive it.
marriage
Anne married William IV, Prince of Orange on March 25, 1734 . Instead of her British title, which she wore in her own right, she used the courtesy title from her husband's hereditary principality. The marriage had six children, two of whom reached adulthood:
- Karoline (February 28, 1743 - May 6, 1787)
- Wilhelm Batavus (March 8, 1748 - April 9, 1806)
Regency
When her husband died in 1751, Anne became regent for her three-year-old son Wilhelm. At first she was considered a good regent with great decisiveness, but later became tyrannical and unpredictable.
Next life
She acted as regent until her death in 1759. Her successor was her mother-in-law Marie Luise von Hessen-Kassel . When she too died, Anne's daughter Karoline became regent until Wilhelm V came of age in 1766. Anne was a master student and benefactor of Georg Friedrich Handel . Her art in figured bass is given special mention in the Critical Letters on the Art of Music by Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg .
literature
- Pauline Puppel: The principle of subsidiarity. The rule of the widowed princesses of Nassau-Diez (-Oranien) , in: Princely widows in the early modern times. On the art and cultural history of a stand, ed. by Ulrike Ilg, Petersberg 2015, pp. 14–26.
- Uwe Schögl (Red.): Orange. 500 years of portraits of a dynasty from the portrait collection of the Austrian National Library, Vienna and the Dutch Royal Collection The Hague. (Exhibition from February 1 to March 19, 2002, Camineum of the Austrian National Library, Vienna). Austrian National Library et al., Vienna 2002, ISBN 3-01-000028-6 , pp. 96–98.
- Alfred Mann: Handel's Composition lessons , Halle Handel Edition - Supplement Volume 1, Bärenreiter 1978.
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Anna of Great Britain, Ireland and Hanover |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Anne, Princess Royal and Princess of Orange |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Princess Royal and by marriage Princess of Orange |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 2, 1709 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Herrenhausen |
| DATE OF DEATH | January 12, 1759 |
| Place of death | The hague |