Talk:Alessandro Torlonia, 5th Prince of Civitella-Cesi

Morganatic marriage to infanta

On the general issue of morganatic marriage: the prevalent notion in English-language sources that a morganatic marriage was between a titled man and an untitled woman, denying she and their progeny his status and titles is overly narrow. First, morganatic marriage is not a gender-specific concept. if children can inherit (non-monetary valuables) from a female but are deprived of that inheritance because the marriage fails to meet family norms, it meets the criteria for morganatic marriage: Famous examples of morganatic husbands are Count Adam von Neipperg and Agustín Fernando Muñoz, 1st Duke of Riánsares. Secondly, morganatic marriage usually refers to dynastic inheritance only -- not money (except civil list), not private property, and not mere noble titles. Principe di Civitella Cesi is a title of the nobility, so of course progeny wouldn't forfeit it by their parents' marrying morganatically, even if it were the Principe (rather than the Infanta) marrying in defiance of family norms. Thirdly, the consequences of morganatic marriages vary widely from dynasty to dynasty, country to country and era to era, so it isn't true that morganatic issue are always denied the dynastic parent's title: Princess Alexandra of Greece, Prince Alexander of Belgium, Prince Frederick Henry of Nassau and Prince Pedro Gastão of Orléans-Braganza are examples of children of morganatic marriages who were allowed to bear dynastic titles -- but lacked succession rights. And what about Countess Luise Karoline von Hochberg? Never acknowledged as Grand Duchess of Baden during the reign of her husband, she is regarded as his morganatic wife -- despite the fact that her son was recognized as heir-eventual during her life-time and later succeeded as Grand Duke Leopold I. All that is clearly agreed upon is that a marriage is morganatic if at least some of the prerogatives retained by dynastic wives and offspring are denied to non-dynastic wives or offspring -- but which prerogatives has always been left up to the dynasty in question. On the specific issue of Infanta Beatriz de Borbon's marriage to Alessandro Torlonia-Civitella, the fact that she renounced her succession rights (but not her title) may seem confusing -- as though the issue have no rights because of the renunciation rather than the unequal marriage. But that isn't so because Spain's dynastic law at the time (Pragmatic Sanction of 1776) was quite specific: even when an unequal marriage is approved by the monarch, the issue are non-dynastic. No one has ever claimed that Beatriz's marriage was dynastic, or that her renunciation was for any reason but unequal marriage (the renunciations of Beatriz, her sister Infanta Maria Cristina {who married a newly-minted "Count Marone" in 1940} and of their brother, Infante Jaime, Duke of Segovia, who married the daughter of a duke in 1935, were all exacted at the time of their marriages by King Alfonso XIII in exile -- whereas no renunciation by their brother Don Juan, Count of Barcelona, who wed a dynastic Bourbon princess in 1935, was sought or obtained). Such renunciations by dynastic princesses were common in monarchies which allowed women to transmit succession rights only upon equal marriage, even if the husband had a ducal or princely title ("All members of the [Romanov] dynasty who married someone not of royal blood were obliged to sign a document renouncing their rights to the throne. Although Irina was very distant in the line of succession, she had to comply with this regulation before marrying me; but it did not seem to worry her very much." Lost Splendor by Prince Felix Yussopov, 1953, chapter XVIII). Marlene Eilers' "Queen Victoria's Descendants", 1997, pp.117-118, states "Carlos III wanted to prevent the possibility of descendants of Spanish noble families from succeeding to the throne. Because the right of succession was shared by men and women, the burden of marrying royal fell to the Infantas, as well...King Juan Carlos's two sisters, Infantas Pilar and Margarita, also lost their rights when they married members of the Spanish aristocracy. They and their aunts retained their royal status and remain members of the Spanish royal family...King Juan Carlos's cousins and nieces and nephews, are considered to be members of the king's family, but are not members of the Royal Family." Francisco Zorrilla's Genealogia de la Casa de Borbon de Espana, 1971, pp. 204-205, states of Beatriz,"Previa renuncia a los derechos sucesorios eventuales a la Corona de Espana, caso morganaticamente en Roma en la Basilica de Santa Maria in Trastevere, el dia 14 de enero de 1935, con Don Alejandro de Torlonia, Principe de Civitella Cessi." And CEDRE's "Le Royaume d'Espagne", Volume III, page 166, says, "elle renonce a ses droits au trone royal d'Espagne en se mariant (cette renonciation est stipulee sur son contrat de mariage bien qu'elle soit automatique selon les termes de la Pragmatique Sanction de 1776 car ce mariage etait morganatique)..." I'll add the cites. FactStraight (talk) 08:02, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

In reaction to stated above. I will not discuss the accuracy of the word "morganatically" in English which is not my first language, and it is a fact that the Pragmatic Sanction (Royal Decree) of Charles III (1776) deprives of surname, arms, titles of nobility (strictly speaking), honours and predicate a dynastic prince or princess who marries unequally (or without royal authorisation) unless the King states otherwise, which was in the power and meaning of Charles III of Spain, who wanted his younger brother to cease to be object of intrigues from courtiers wishing to replace the King with him : he knew a Count of Chinchón, no more an Infant or a Royal Highness, and physically at a day's travel from the Court, was no more a political danger, while his descendants may get back more — which two of them did. So, he issued this decree, and married his younger brother in the nobility, making him believe no princess wanted to marry him. What he couldn't do, and very probably didn't mean to do, was to alter automatically the order of succession, although this decree facilitated, again in a political way, in case it would be needed in the future, a vote of exclusion by the Cortes (a special Parliament) of a prince who would have made a really "wrong" marriage. Because in Spain, to alter the order of succession, there must be the King's will AND a vote by the Cortes. It is very little known because from the 30's, Don Juan de Borbón (with approbation by his father Alfonso XIII, who expected to retrieve his throne and to get the Cortes to vote the exclusion of several princes) made people believe there was a sort of automatic exclusion from royal succession as soon as a prince married unequally, which was obviously wrong, but was meant to make easier a later vote by the Cortes and a general acceptance of such exclusions. And all known uninformed or biased sources (among which, the three quoted) state in this way. But both laws and case law show it is wrong. Even a renunciation of a prince, accepted by the King, has no value (other than moral for the prince himself, but not for his issue) unless the Cortes vote it. This was for instance the case with Infanta Maria Teresa, daughter of Philip IV and wife of Louis XIV of France, who had renounced to her Spanish dynastic rights before her marriage : her renunciation was never voted by the Cortes, who, all her siblings being dead without living issue in 1699, chose not to vote it at the end of her brother Charles II's life, allowing her grandson to become King of Spain. In case law too, we can see that of all the unequal marriages among Spanish dynastic princes, only two gave way to an exclusion from the succession : the "merely unequal" but disallowed marriage of Henry, Duke of Seville (brother of King Francis' and close relative of Queen Isabel II) into the nobility, and the "notable and manifest"-ly unequal (and equally disallowed) marriage of his sister Infanta Josefina Fernanda to José Güell y Renté the next year. None other, from XVIIIth Century do Alfonso XIII's exile in 1931, gave way to an exclusion by the King or the Cortes, and among these many, the royally approved marriages of the said younger brother of Charles III (Infante Luis then Count of Chinchón), or of Infanta Luisa Teresa with the duque of Sessa in 1848 (and the text of the royal decree of February 11th, 1848 show no reference to a dynastic exclusion, whereas the royal decree issued on the occasion of the marriage of Infanta Josefina Fernanda in 1847 did mention the dynastic question would be submitted to the Cortes in a different paragraph from the question relative to Charles III's Pragmática Sanción); Alfonso XIII himself, being king, had chosen to marry for love a princess from a non-sovereign, morganatic house. So, in this case, "morganatic" cannot have a dynastic implication — though it is today of little importance, many successors having born and had issue closer to the throne, not speaking of the fact the present Spanish Monarchy can arguably be considered of a different essence from the traditional one.

Link to Royal Decrees in Spanish :

https://www.heraldica.org/topics/royalty/sp_succ.htm#4%20decrees

(Many thanks to François Velde, from whom I learnt many things though his site has a few errors, for instance the 1713 "semi-salic law" was not voted by the Cortes, so problems would have arisen should it not have been "repelled" in 1789). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2003:DC:AF01:3A92:8D41:9359:3B5:8ED6 (talk) 22:13, 22 November 2020 (UTC)