Re: Crown Prince Rudolph--controversies, affairs & his death

[aor]

nice pics of rudolph!

without the beard i find him very handsome...if i lived back then i would be happy 2 be mary vetsera or mitzi caspar :p

Keep in mind that medical help was not well advanced.......

[Yelena Aleksandrovna]

The crown prince was very handsome when he was young, but sadly in his last photos
he looks very bad, poor he looks older than he was, is really sad to think about this. I read
that he started looking as this ways for the drugs that he used the last years of his life.
 :-(

[carl fraley]

SO just out of curiousity if permission was given to exhume the body of HI & RH Crown Prince Rudolph for Testing to find out what happened, who's decision would it be?  His own descendants through his daughter HIH Archduchess Elizabeth or HIH Archduke OTTO as Head of the Imperial House? 

Who actually has say so over the Imperial Crypt?

From a legal point wouldn't it be Rudolph's own descendants since Austria doesn't legally recognise the Imperial House?

[nena]

And I will pay tribute to beloved Crown Prince Rudolf and his mistress Marty Vetsera who died tragically and under all those mysterious circumstances on that January morning in 1889.
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Mayerling accident has always been linked with Sarajevo episode in 1914. I sometimes really wonder, would the World War 1st have happened, if Rudolf had been the new Emperor of the Empire. If he hadn't died, most likely he would give more freedom to other nationalities in Empire (Slovaks, Serbs, Croats, and so on....). Most likely he would, since he was known as 'liberal Prince'. And I don't know would annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1908 would have happened? Maybe Revolts would never happen, and maybe that maybe already doomed Empire would have lived longer...?
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Mayelring is a haunting story, tragic and short Romance, deaths resulted love colored in dozens and dozens books and movies. IMO, he didn't kill Mary. He simply couldn't. Just IMO.  I know that he was a suicidal person, I saw his drawings he did while he was boy, and they are filled with blood and violence scenes. I was shocked. I somehow like that story. I read about it a bit, and I dislike all stories about Mary's remains, they were digged up and moved several times...I just think that he killed himself (strange , some source label that he was murdered).I think he killed himself and Mary was either murdered or died accidentally. From what I have heard, she died first. I feel sorry for them. I also like the way they look. Btw, I was shocked by large number of photos taken of them.  
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R.I.P. Crown Prince Rudolf and Baroness Mary Vetsera (who died tragically on January 30th 1889).

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The Funeral of young prince and Alter Sloss Mayerling :



Allegedly his last photo taken on January 27th 1889:



From magazine 'Royal Romances', Princess Stephanie of Belgium describes Mary:


Direct links : Page 1 ; Page 2.

Rudolph and Stephanie:



From a movie and a card dedicated to young Prince:


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All photos belong to archives and to owners.

[Carolath Habsburg]

Rest in peace, Rudolph!

[Yelena Aleksandrovna]

Unknown for me this painting of Marie Vetsera, she looks better on it than in photos

[Imperial_Grounds]

Well, we all know Mary was not the greatest beauty, I certainly think she was charming but not too beautiful. Whatever happens, I believe the original story - Mary's letters prove it, either he killed her or she did it herself -

It does remain a haunting story, up to this day, the way Mary's body was handled, the burials and all that simply seem to come from a horror movie... And in all this Mary is lost as the sweet young girl who had fell in love with the handsome prince, but Mary was not sweet and naive, neither she was manipulative. She was simply a teenager who adored Rudolf and loved him so deeply that she chose death over life...

As Mary herself wrote it in her final letter, she could not live without Rudolf and chose to share his fate... And I do understand Rudolf, he was not the kind of man who should have married, like his mother he wanted too much freedom and was too restless to be in a long relationship, he needed his freedom and the only woman who did not really claim him was Mizzi, he asked her to die with him first(which must mean something), he even asked Stephanie and then Mary.... It certainly was not true love, they spend too little time together(as a couple) to know all that, it was simply love - not true love, for as far that exists - but no matter what happened, it makes a great tragic romance as it certainly must have been. But we must not forget that Rudolf was suicidal but also afraid to die alone, and Mary was giving all that up for him... So he chose her.

Also I intend to buy the autobiography of Princess Stephanie 'I was to be Empress' which recounts her side of this tragic tale.

[Yelena Aleksandrovna]

Perhaps they are

[Carolath Habsburg]

here the large version of the first one posted

[Linnie]

A few months ago, I bought a special issue of the French magazine Point de vue on some historical enigmas, and there was an article on Crown Prince Rudolph death and some pictures. The most startling (to me, anyway) was a nude painting of Mary Vetsera, said to have surfaced a few years back. The painting, if it happens to be genuine, does contradict the image of Mary Vetsera as a virgin, chaste, ingenue young girl. Has anyone else seen it?

[Rani]

Do you mean this?

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Fu5ATGKBQdFTW7j6qkg9Yg

I was confused, too, when I saw it.

[Mandie, the Gothic Empress]

I really doubt that Marie was even a virgin at 15, she was sweet but also stupid (not saying teens are stupid but come on having killing yourself or let someone kill you over puppy love? really stupid of you).   Because She had an English older boyfriend at 15 for awhile and even had a Portuguese Prince drooling over her, not sure what happened between them.

Rudolph didn't really love her in my opinion, he was a coward- and didn't wanna die alone so asking both his Official Mistress and Wife to die with him, both said no, then asking a naive teenager that has the hots for you and do anything for you = both dead.

Its a real shame, Rudolph didn't get medical help like they have now a days and that Marie allowed herself to end her life by the man she loved. Also I feel bad for Countess Larisch- the go between liar-  she too got caught in this, however I think she was innocent over the issue of Mayerling .  I have sympathy for Emperor Franz Josef but not for Empress Sissi.

[Linnie]

Yes, that is the painting.
I have always thought that young noble girls destined to marry well had to remain pure up until their wedding. Also, Mary's mother was very ambitious for her daughter and, for that reason, must have kept a very close eye on her daughter's relationships. So, I am confused. According to the magazine, the painting was made for one of Mary's admirers. How could her mother not know?
I have never thought that Mary Vetsera was Rudolph's great love. She loved him, but he must have been to disillusioned to be in love.

[Kalafrana]

My personal view is that Mary Vetsera was a starry-eyed young thing who fell for the ideal of Rudolf rather than the reality - rather like modern teenage girls becoming obsessed with pop singers. Rudolf wasn't in love with her. To put it at the most charitable, she was no more than a passing fling, but he needed someone to die with, and he picked on her. There is a parallel, I think between Rudolf and Mary and Dodi Fayed and Diana. No suicide in the latter case (or anything beyond an accident), but their association was no more than a passing fancy on both sides which would have fizzled out had they not been killed.

I too find the actions of Mary's mother. If she had been from a lower level of society I could see that she might think becoming the mistress of the Crown Prince was a good career move for her daughter, but not when she was at the level she actually was.

Ann

[Yelena Aleksandrovna]

I knew that Marie Vetsera stoped being virgin at 15-16, when her mother knew that she tryied to marry her as fast as she could, but unsuccesfully