:''For other people named Elizabeth or Elisabeth of Bohemia, see
Elisabeth of Bohemia. For the daughter of
Charles I of England, see
Princess Elizabeth of England''
'Elisabeth, Electress Palatine and Queen of Bohemia' (born 'Princess Elizabeth Stuart of Scotland';
19 August 1596 –
13 February 1662) was the eldest daughter to
James VI of Scotland and his
Queen consort Anne of Denmark. She was thus sister to
Charles I. With the demise of the
Stuart dynasty in 1714, her direct descendants, the
Hanoverian rulers, succeeded to the
British throne.
Biography
Princess Elizabeth Stuart, 1606, by Robert Peake the Elder.
At the time of Elizabeth's birth at
Falkland Palace,
Fife, her father was still the
King of Scots only. She was named in honour of the
Queen of England, in an attempt by her father to flatter the old queen, whose kingdom he hoped to inherit. When the younger Elizabeth was six years old, in
1603, her namesake died and James succeeded to the thrones of
England and
Ireland, making his daughter a much more attractive bride.
Part of the intent of the
Gunpowder Plot of
1605 was to put the nine year old Elizabeth onto the throne of England (and, presumably, Scotland) as a
Catholic monarch, after
assassinating her father and the
Protestant English aristocracy. At the time of the plot she was staying at
Coombe Abbey in
Warwickshire, from where the conspirators planned to kidnap her.
On
14 February 1613, she married
Frederick V, then
Elector of the
Palatinate, and took up her place in the court at
Heidelberg. Frederick was the leader of the association of Protestant princes in the
Holy Roman Empire known as the
Evangelical Union, and Elizabeth was married to him in an effort to increase James's ties to these princes. In
1619, Frederick was offered and accepted the crown of
Bohemia, but his rule was brief, and Elizabeth became known as the "Winter Queen". She was also sometimes called "Queen of Hearts" because of her popularity.
Driven into exile, the couple took up residence in
The Hague, and Frederick died in
1632. Elizabeth remained in Holland even after her son,
Charles I Louis, regained his father's electorship in
1648. Following the
Restoration of the English & Scottish monarchies, she travelled to
London to visit her nephew,
Charles II, and died while there. Her daughter was known later as
Sophia of Hanover; pursuant to the English
Act of Settlement 1701, the Electress Sophia and her issue were made heirs to the English & Scottish thrones (later British throne), so that all monarchs of Great Britain from
George I are descendants of Elizabeth.
Ancestors
Children
#
Frederick Henry von der Pfalz (
1614-
1629) - (
Drowned)
#
Charles I Louis, Elector Palatine (
1617-
1680)
#
Elisabeth of Bohemia, Princess Palatine (
1618-
1680)
#
Rupert, Duke of Cumberland (
1619-
1682)
#
Maurice (
1620-
1654) - (
Drowned)
# Louise Hollandine (
18 April 1622-
11 February 1709)
# Ludwig (
21 August 1624-
24 December 1624)
#
Edward, Count Palatine of Simmern (
1625-
1663)
# Henrietta Maria (
7 July 1626-
18 September 1651); married Prince Sigismund of Siebenbuergen on
16 June 1651
# Johann Philip Frederick (
26 September 1627-
15 December 1650); also reported to have been born on
15 September 1629
# Charlotte (
19 December 1628-
14 January 1631)
#
Sophia, Electress of Hanover (
14 October 1630-
8 June 1714)
# Gustavus Adolphus (
14 January 1632-
1641)
See also
★
Thirty Years' War
Fiction
In
WG Sebald's novel ''Vertigo'' (
1990), a woman appears whom the narrator, travelling through Heidelberg by train in
1987, recognizes instantly "without a shadow of a doubt" as Elizabeth when she enters his carriage.
Biblography
★ Jessica Gorst-Williams, ''Elizabeth, the Winter Queen'' (1977) ISBN 0-200-72472-X
★ Josephine Ross, ''The Winter Queen: The Story of Elizabeth Stuart'' (1979) ISBN 0-312-88232-7, ISBN 0-297-77603-7
★ Carola Oman, ''The Winter Queen: Elisabeth of Bohemia'' (2000) ISBN 1-84212-057-3
★ Jane Stevenson, ''The Winter Queen: A Novel'' (2002) ISBN 0-618-14912-0, ISBN 0-618-38267-4
★ Frances Yates, ''The Rosicrucian Enlightenment'' (1972) devotes its early chapters to describing her 1613 wedding and the reputation she and her husband had in Europe at the time
External links
العربية
中国
Français
Deutsch
Ελληνική
हिन्दी
Italiano
日本語
Português
Русский
Español
