![]() The only son of emperor Franz Josef, Crown Prince Rudolf had been born on August 21, 1858, ending a run of unwanted baby girls.įor Franz Josef, the arrival of a viable heir had been such a cause for celebration that he’d made Rudolf commander of an entire infantry regiment the very next day. He really did value guns and uniforms and enjoyed his conservative upbringing. Still, it’s not like Ferdinand’s horticultural side was a sign of an artistic spirit. While other Habsburg men valued their guns and uniforms, Franz Ferdinand found an unlikely outlet in flowers.įrom early childhood, it’s said that he never looked quite as content as when he was gently pressing a rose between the pages of a book. Perhaps the only way the boy diverged from the standard Habsburg mold was in his passion for botany. In fact, Franz Ferdinand’s upbringing was so utterly average that there’s very little to say about it. From Commons: Princess Maria Annunziata of Bourbon-Two Sicilies, Archduke Karl Ludwig of Austria and two of their sons.īut it was unlikely enough that Ferdinand was kept away from the corridors of power, even as he had to go through the standard Habsburg upbringing of God, army, and duty. Since Franz Josef already had a son – Rudolf – there was little chance young Ferdinand would ever become emperor himself. Not that baby Franz Ferdinand got much out of his famous uncle. Karl Ludwig was the brother was Franz Josef, the Habsburg emperor of Austria. Yet, for all their dull respectability, the family did have one claim on being interesting. His mother, Maria Annunziata, was a Bourbon princess who’d done nothing of note. ![]() In fact, they were in a period of relative peace that had allowed Ferdinand’s ostensibly-military family to become lazy and boring.įerdinand’s father, Archduke Karl Ludwig, was as staid and conservative as a church belltower. Not that being enemies meant the empires were at war. Franz Ferdinand, meanwhile, had been born into the chilly air of the Ottomans’ ancient enemy: Austria. You Franz FerdinandĪt the time, Sarajevo was within the orbit of the decaying Ottoman Empire. In today’s Biographics, we’re investigating the life of the man whose death started WWI… and considering what might have happened had he lived.Īt the moment Franz Ferdinad first opened his eyes, on 18 December 1863, not even the greatest seer could’ve predicted the tortured route that would lead to him dying on an anonymous Sarajevo street half a century later. As emperor-in-waiting, Ferdinand implemented reforms and worked on plans that could’ve changed everything… only for an assassin’s bullet to cut him down too soon. Until, one day, tragic events conspired to make him heir to his family’s empire. But who was Franz Ferdinand? Who was this obscure archduke whose death set the world ablaze?īorn into a branch of the Austrian royal family, Franz Ferdinand seemed destined for a life of rich obscurity.
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