Victor Amadeus II family name Savoia
Victor Amadeus II (Vittorio Amedeo Francesco; 14 May 1666 – 31 October 1732) was the head of the House of Savoy and ruler of the Savoyard states from 1675 to 1730. He was the first of his house to acquire a royal crown, ruling first as King of Sicily (1713–1720) and then as King of Sardinia (1720–1730). Among his other titles were Duke of Savoy, Duke of Montferrat, Prince of Piedmont, Marquis of Saluzzo and Count of Aosta, Maurienne and Nice.
Louis XIV arranged his marriage in order to maintain French influence in Savoy, but Victor Amadeus soon broke away from the influence of France. At his father's death in 1675, his mother, Marie Jeanne Baptiste of Nemours, was regent in the name of her nine-year-old son and would remain in de facto power until 1684 when Victor Amadeus banished her further involvement in the state. Having fought in the War of the Spanish Succession, he was rewarded with the Kingdom of Sicily in 1713, but he was forced to exchange this title for the poorer Kingdom of Sardinia in 1720.Victor Amadeus left a considerable cultural influence in Turin, remodeling the Royal Palace of Turin, Palace of Venaria, Palazzina di caccia of Stupinigi, as well as building the Basilica of Superga where he rests.Family and issue
His distant relationship with his mother was always strained and has been blamed on her ambition to keep power to herself. Marie Jeanne spent most of her time relegated to state business which she enjoyed and had little time for her only child whom she kept under close supervision in order to make sure he would not try to assume power. Anne Marie gave her husband six children but also had two stillbirths of each gender, one in 1691 and again in 1697. Three of these children would go on to have further progeny, including the eldest Maria Adelaide, who was the mother of Louis XV of France. His second daughter Maria Luisa, known in the family as Louison, would marry Philip V of Spain in 1701 and was also regent of Spain for various periods. These two marriages were tactics used by Louis XIV to keep Victor Amadeus close to France prior to the War of the Spanish Succession.Anne Marie would remain a devoted wife. She quietly accepted his extramarital affairs; the longest one being with the famed beauty Jeanne Baptiste d'Albert de Luynes by whom he had two children. Jeanne Baptiste was his mistress for eleven years and eventually fled Savoy due to Victor Amadeus' obsession with her. Victor Amadeus subsequently had his daughter with Jeanne Baptiste, Maria Vittoria, marry the Prince of Carignano from which the present Vittorio Emanuele, Prince of Naples is a direct descendant. His favourite child was Victor Amadeus born in 1699 and given the title Prince of Piedmont as heir apparent. The Prince of Piedmont later died in 1715 from smallpox. Anne Marie died in 1728 after a series of heart attacks.His relationship with his younger son and eventual successor Charles Emmanuel was a cold one and the two were never close. Victor Amadeus organised the first two marriages of Charles Emmanuel, the first one being to Anne Christine of Sulzbach, daughter of the Count Palatine of Sulzbach, which produced a son who died in infancy. The second marriage was to Polyxena of Hesse-Rotenburg, a first cousin of Anne Christine and mother of six children, including the future Victor Amadeus III of Sardinia.
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