page_title: Maria Christina, Duchess of Teschen
section_title: Last years and death
hierarchical_section_title: Maria Christina, Duchess of Teschen / Life / Last years and death
caption_attribution_description: Italiano: Antonio Canova Cenotafio (Monumento funebre senza il corpo) all'arciduchessa Maria Cristina d'Austria, stile Neoclassico, presso la chiesa degli agostiniani (Vienna); panorama realizzato nell'agosto 2014, da 5 foto (fotocamera Pentax K-5 II - obbiettivo Tamron SP AF 17-50mm F2,8) ed unite con hugin 2013 (proiezione Mercatore traversa), piccole correzioni con gimp, sistema operativo Linux (Ubuntu 12.04 64bit) Deutsch: Augustinerkirche, ehem. Hofpfarrkirche hl. Augustin English: Antonio Canova Cenotaph of Archduchess Maria Christina Augustinerkirche (Wien);panorama made at August 2014, with 5 photos (camera Pentax K-5 II - lens Tamron SP AF 17-50mm F2,8) and stitcher with hugin 2013 (Transverse mercator projection), small correction with gimp, OS Linux Ubuntu 12.04 64bit &#160; This media shows the protected monument with the number 77182 in Austria. (Commons, de, Wikidata)
context_page_description: Maria Christina, Duchess of Teschen, was the fifth child of Maria Theresa of Austria and Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor. Married in 1766 to Prince Albert of Saxony, the couple received the Duchy of Teschen, and she was appointed Governor of the Austrian Netherlands jointly with her husband during 1781–1789 and 1791–1792. After two expulsions from the Netherlands, she lived with her husband in Vienna until her death.
context_section_description: Maria Christina no longer exercised any political influence. After a stay in Münster during the winter of 1792-1793 she moved with the seriously ill Albert to his hometown Dresden. They lived harmoniously, but without their previous warm relationship, and therefore no longer had such an elaborate court. At the beginning of 1794 they learned that the Emperor would now give them financial support. After their permanent move to Vienna, Maria Christina and her husband lived in the palace of Count Emanuel Silva-Tarouca. In the future, Albert was mainly concerned in his art collection. After the rise of Napoleon, Maria Christina was deeply shocked when she knew about the military clashes and the signing of the Treaty of Campo Formio (18 October 1797) between Napoleon and Francis II.
  In 1797 Maria Christina, who had become melancholic, began to suffer from a stomach disease. She went to bathing in Teplitz in July 1797 and had a short-term improvement in her health, but soon suffered again with great pain. Due to the restructuring of the Augustinerbastei, she and her husband rented the Palais Kaunitz and moved there. After a new short recovery, Maria Christina became more and more sick in the middle of June 1798; after wrote to Albert a farewell letter in which she mentioned her deep and lifelong love for him, she died the following day on 24 June 1798 aged 56. She was buried in the Tuscan Vault of the Imperial Crypt in Vienna. Her heart was buried separately and is located in the Herzgruft, behind the Loreto Chapel in the Augustinian Church within the Hofburg Palace complex in Vienna.
  After the death of his wife, the deeply saddened Albert built an impressive tombstone for Maria Christina in the Augustinian church. In the ornaments of this tomb, a work of the famous neoclassical sculptor Antonio Canova, were was notably seen that not a single Christian symbol can be displayed but several Freemasons motifs were shown. The flat wall pyramid contains a medallion of Maria Christina's and figures made on Carrara marble. It bears the inscription Uxori Optimae Albertus, implying a dedication from Albert to his excellent wife. In a book published in 1805 by Van de Vivere, which deals with the tomb of Canova and is also present in a German translation of the same year, it is clearly shown that the grave monument has arisen out of the Christian thought, although the impact of Enlightenment is noticeable. The funds and the interpretation of language of allegory Canova created the symbols and figures that in the thinking of antiquity found use and in the early Christian period, to mourn and to bury him a man's death. After his death in 1822, Albert was buried next to her and their daughter.
caption: Cenotaph to Marie Christine of Austria in the Augustinerkirche, by Canova
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