It is to be added that shortly after the Fall of Constantinople (29 May 1453) a meeting of the Order of the Golden Fleece was held in which 31 knights stood up and swore to embark on a crusade to liberate the Eastern Roman Empire. On the banquet stage there was an allegorical display; the Eastern Empire represented by a fallen woman being guarded by the lion on the Bourguignon shield. This promise was never materialized, but the Anti-Islamic character of the Order is plainly evident.
Due to lack of male heir to Charles the Fearless, son of Philip III the Good, and because of the marriage of Mary of Burgundy, daughter of Charles the Fearless, with the Austrian Archduke Maximilian, the later Holy Roman Emperor, the Order passed with her to the Habsburgs. Maximilian's and Mary's son, Philip the Handsome, and their grandson, Charles V, ruled over Spain because of their marriages. And as the latter was the last to rule over Spain and the Holy Roman Empire combined, the Order was divided into two branches, the Spanish and the Austrian, which have survived down to our days.
The Spanish branch of the Order passed from the Habsburgs to the Bourbons in 1700 because of the dynastic change (Philip V ruled Spain because of the will of Charles II), whereas the Austrian branch of the Order is ruled by Prince Otto von Habsburg, son to the last Austrian Emperor, and de jure heir of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. Today, the Austrian branch of the Order of the Golden Fleece has 50 members, all Catholic and noble.
Categories : 
1:31 AM
Moderate Islamist here
0 comments:
Post a Comment