Anna Vasa of Sweden
Anna of Sweden | |
---|---|
Catherine Jagellon | |
Religion | Lutheranism |
Anna Vasa of Sweden (also Anne,
Biography
Early life
Anna was the youngest child of
Several marriages were suggested. In 1577, there had been discussions to arrange the marriage between Anna and an Austrian Archduke, either
After the death of her mother, her maternal aunt Queen Anna Jagiellon suggested that she be sent to Poland to be raised there, but was turned down by John III. She had her own court, supervised by her mother's former Mistress of the Robes, Karin Gyllenstierna; one of her maids-of-honours being her cousin, Princess Sigrid of Sweden.
Move to Poland
In 1587, her brother, Sigismund, was elected
In 1589, Anna accompanied Sigismund to the meeting with their father in
In 1592, Anna returned to Poland to attend the wedding between her brother and Anna of Austria. She was disliked at the Polish court because of her religion and the influence she had over Sigismund and was suspected of having supported her father's failed plan to arrange a Protestant marriage for Sigismund with Christina of Holstein-Gottorp.[2] The Archbishop was so provoked by her Lutheran services that he threatened both Anna and Sigismund with excommunication. Her sister-in-law Anna of Austria, however, prevented any persecution.[2] In July 1593, she carried her new niece Anna Maria at her baptismal.
Cardinal Andrew Báthory proposed a marriage for her with the Prince of Transylvania. However Anna became engaged to marry her father's first cousin Count Gustaf Brahe (1558-1615), son of Per Brahe the Elder and a future general in Poland.[2] They were raised together at court and were reportedly mutually in love with each other, and there were rumors that they met each other in secret in the home of Brahe's sister Ebba Sparre.[3] In 1587, Gustaf Brahe followed Sigismund and Anna to Poland when Sigismund was elected king there. In 1589, he formally asked Sigismund for Anna's hand, and while he was not given a clear answer, he was not refused, which made him hope that he might be accepted.[3] The potential marriage between princess Anna and Gustaf Brahe was fiercely opposed by Duke Charles, who viewed it as a plot of Gustav Brahe to make princess Anna ruling queen regnant of Sweden while her only brother Sigismund was absent in Poland, and he therefore used their relationship in his libelous chronicle Karlskrönikan.[3] Although it was not the most desirable marriage proposed, Anna declined all other suitors. As time passed, nothing came of her intended marriage, and both Anna and Brahe remained unmarried. A definite explanation of this has not been found in historical sources, but Gustaf Brahe remained at the side of Sigismund and Anna all his life and ultimately followed them to Poland when they left Sweden for good.[3]
Her brother's Swedish reign
In November 1592, her brother Sigismund succeeded to the throne of Sweden at the death of their father. In September 1593, Anna returned to Sweden in the company of her brother King Sigismund and her sister-in-law Queen Anna. She was regarded with distrust by the Papal envoy Germanico Malaspina.
In 1594, Sigismund returned to Poland, while Anna remained in Sweden. Papal envoy Malaspina had convinced him to leave her behind because of her involvement in the religious riot in Riddarholmskyrkan and reminded him about the Archbishop's threat of excommunication.
The Sparre Affair was to be the final break between Anna and Duke Charles. Count Erik Larsson Sparre was a staunch supporter of Sigismund, and Anna kept a box for his wife, Ebba Sparre, sister of her head lady in waiting Margareta Brahe (1559–1638), at Stegeborg, which Duke Charles suspected of containing suspicious documents.[2] When Anna left Stegeborg to attend the death bed of queen dowager Gunilla Bielke in 1597, Duke Charles had her household searched, the box of Ebba Sparre and the correspondence between Anna and the Sparre couple confiscated, and subjected Ebba Sparre as well as her sister Anna's senior lady in waiting Margareta Brahe to an interrogation regarding the Cryptography he found in Anna's papers, and accused Ebba Sparre of having smuggled in her brother, Anna's alleged lover Gustav Brahe to her.[4]
From 1592, Sigismund negotiated a marriage between Anna and Margrave
Later life in Poland
After 1598, Anna spent the rest of her life in Poland, though she always referred to herself as a Princess of Sweden. Known as Anna of Svecia (Anna of Sweden), she was a
During the captivity of Carl Gyllenhielm, an illegitimate son of Duke Charles, in Poland in 1610–13, she gave him much attention. She was given the task of interrogating Gyllenhielm by Sigismund, who listened hidden by a curtain.[2] She accused Charles of conspiracy to entice conflict between Sigismund and John III, something Gyllenhielm denied.[2]
Anna remained unmarried. In 1602, duke
Sigismund made Anna starosta of Brodnica in 1605 and Golub in 1611. She divided her time between her fief and the court of her brother. Anna's appanage was Strasburg (now Brodnica), a Royal Prussian district in Poland near the Baltic, where she lived in Golub and Strasburg. She became very respected because of her great learning. She was interested in literature, music, gardening and medicine. She was a specialist in medicinal herbs and kept her own apothecary. With the help of an Italian assistant, she made her own experiments in herbal medicine.[2] She financed the herbarium of Simon Syrenius.[2]
Anna was buried at the Church of St. Mary in Toruń, Poland several years after her death, as the Pope had first forbidden the burial of a Protestant in a blessed graveyard in Catholic Poland. Her nephew, king Władysław IV Vasa, got that decree reversed. He built a beautiful black Dębnik marble tomb monument with a white alabaster figure of his beloved aunt.
Ancestry
Ancestors of Anna Vasa of Sweden | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Gallery
-
Anna by Elbfas (unidentified by Nationalmuseum but accepted by academic writers)
-
Palace of Anna Vasa in Brodnica, where she resided.
-
Monument to Anna in Brodnica
-
Castle inattic.
-
Nave of the Church of Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Toruń, where she was buried.
-
Portal to Anna Vasa's mausoleum in the Church of Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Toruń.
-
Effigy of Anna Vasa from her mausoleum
References
- ^ Academic historians Lars W Ericson (p. 318), Dr. Ulf Sundberg (p. 63 acknowledging other opinions) & Dr. David Norrman (p. 128h)
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab Anna, urn:sbl:18719, Svenskt biografiskt lexikon (art av H. Almquist.), hämtad 2013-12-07.
- ^ a b c d e Gustaf Brahe, urn:sbl:18043, Svenskt biografiskt lexikon (art av B. BOËTHIUS.), hämtad 2017-12-29.
- ^ Tegenborg Falkdalen, Karin, Vasadrottningen: en biografi över Katarina Stenbock 1535-1621, Historiska media, Lund, 2015
- Anteckningar om svenska qvinnor / (In Swedish)
- Svenskt biografiskt handlexikon / (In Swedish)
- http://www.visittorun.pl/386,l2.html#vasa
- http://www.historiesajten.se/visainfo.asp?id=588