Anka Obrenović
Anka Obrenović | |
---|---|
Princess of Serbia | |
Born | 1 April 1821 Serbia |
Died | 10 June 1868 (aged 47) Belgrade, Serbia |
Spouse | Alexander Konstantinović |
Issue | Alexander Konstantinović Katarina Konstantinović Simeona Lakhovari (illegitimate) |
House | House of Obrenović |
Father | Jevrem Obrenović |
Mother | Thomanija Bogičević |
Religion | Serbian Orthodox |
Occupation | writer, society leader |
Princess Anka Obrenović (later Anka Konstantinović,
She was assassinated alongside her first cousin
Family
Princess Anka was born on 1 April 1821,[3] the third daughter of Prince Jevrem Obrenović and Tomanija Bogićević, daughter of Vojvoda Antonije Bogićević. Her father, who also served as Governor of Belgrade and Regent of Serbia (1839), was a younger brother of Serbian Prince Miloš Obrenović I. Her paternal grandparents were Teodor Mihailovic, who had been an impoverished land-owner originally from Montenegro, and Višnja Gojković. She had four sisters, Jelena, Simeona, Jekaterina, and Anastasia; and one brother, Miloš, whose son would later reign as Prince Milan IV and King Milan I.
Early literary achievements
She was described as having been "very beautiful, very intelligent, and well-educated".[4] She was evidently more modern than Prince Miloš's daughters Petrija and Savka, who still wore traditional Turkish garb.[4] In fact, an extant painting of Anka shows her seated at her piano wearing a fashionable and elegant gown. She was actually one of the few people in Serbia at that time who owned and played the piano.[2] It was Anka's very modernity that later earned her the sobriquet Anka pomodarka ("Anka the fashionable")
A Frenchman who met Anka commented on her good looks, wit, and considerable accomplishments;
Anka, still in her teens, attracted and inspired many poets, some of whom dedicated poems as well as entire volumes of poetry to her, enthusiastically comparing her to the
Marriage and issue
In 1842, she married Alexander Konstantinović, son of Obrad Konstantinović (paternal first cousin of Konstantin Hadija, Prince Jevrem Obrenović's son-in-law) and Danica Gvozdenović, by whom she had two children:
- Colonel Alexander Konstantinović (died 1914), married Milena Opuić, by whom he had one daughter, Natalija and one son, Vladimir.
- General Milivoje Blaznavac(16 May 1824 – 5 April 1873), by whom she had issue; she married secondly, Mihajlo Bogićević (1843–1899).
In 1860, she established one of the first Serbian salons at her home. Anka's "art gathering" as it was called, "greatly influenced the spiritual rebirth of Serbian society in the 1860s".[2] Anka invited the most prominent artistic and intellectual women in Belgrade, as well as the wives of foreign diplomats to her celebrated salon, which featured musical performances along with readings of Serbian, French, German, and Italian poetry.[2] Discussions about politics and current affairs also took place at the meetings.
Sometime after her husband's death, Princess Anka and her daughter, Katarina were invited by her cousin Prince Mihailo to live at the royal court. On an unknown date, Anka gave birth to an illegitimate daughter by her former brother-in-law, Jovan Ghermani, who was the husband of her late sister, Simeona, who had died in 1837 at the age of 19. Anka bestowed her dead sister's name on her daughter. The child, Simeona (1858-1915) would later go on to marry an important Romanian minister, Alexander Lahovary (1841–1897), member of the aristocratic Lahovary family, by whom she had issue; and she would serve Queen consort Elisabeth of Romania as one of her ladies-in-waiting.
Assassination
Since the death of Prince Miloš in September 1860, his only surviving son and Anka's first cousin, Prince Mihailo had ruled Serbia for the second time after being deposed in 1842 in favour of
The Serbian newspapers announced her death with the obituary: "With his Royal Highness, his cousin Mrs.[nb 1] Anka Konstantinovic was also killed".[5]
Legacy
In 1902, Princess Anka's granddaughter, Natalija Konstantinović married Prince Mirko of Montenegro. The king who sat on the Serbian throne was Anka's great-nephew Alexander I who was married to the much older and unpopular, Draga Mašin. As Princess Natalija was Anka's granddaughter, thus a descendant of the Obrenović dynasty, the Serbian government promised that should Alexander die childless, which seemed likely after Queen Draga's false pregnancies and encroaching age, the crown of Serbia would pass to Prince Mirko.[3] Events, however did not proceed according to the hopes of Prince Mirko and Princess Natalija. Following the brutal
Princess Anka's descendants are the only known surviving line of the Obrenović dynasty, which became extinct in the male line upon the
See also
- Obrenović family tree
- Ana Marija Marović
- Eustahija Arsić
- Milica Stojadinović-Srpkinja
- Staka Skenderova
- Draga Dejanović
Notes
- ^ Note: This is possibly mistranslated by the author from the original Serbian gospođa which could also mean Lady
References
- ^ a b c Hawkesworth, pp.100-101
- ^ a b c d Vucetic, Radina, The Emancipation of Women in Interwar Belgrade and the Cvijeta Zuzoric Society (an essay, Google)
- ^ a b The Esoteric Curiosa: A Right Royal Balkan Debacle: Mirko and Natalia
- ^ a b c d Hawkesworth, p.100
- ^ a b Hawkesworth, p.101
- ^ Tomasović, Mirko (20 March 2003). "Matica hrvatska - Vrsni katalog emocija i epiteta". Vijenac (in Croatian). Matica hrvatska. Retrieved 17 June 2010.
- ^ a b Alexander Palace Time Machine
- ISBN 0-313-31290-7
- ^ Sulzberger, pp.202, 221
- ^ Sulzberger, pp.198, 202
Bibliography
- Hawkesworth, Celia (2000). Voices in the shadows: women and verbal art in Serbia and Bosnia (Google Books). Budapest: Central European University Press.
- ISBN 978-0-517-52817-4.