Archduke Rainer of Austria (30 September 1783 – 16 January 1853) was a Viceroy of the Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia from 1818 to 1848. He was also an Archduke of Austria, Prince Royal of Hungary and Bohemia.
Although Rainer suffered from a mild form of epilepsy, this did not visibly interfere with his military career.[1]
Rainer served as Viceroy of the Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia from 1818 to 1848. The position made Rainer and his wife the head of the Austrian court at Milan. Rainer's politics were increasingly unpopular, the Italians resented him for their lack of political freedom and for collecting revenues with so little benefit to them.
Throughout the 1840s, the political situation worsened to such an extent that in 1847, Klemens von Metternich resurrected his 1817 plans for an Italian chancellery by sending his right-hand man Count Karl Ludwig von Ficquelmont to Milan as acting Chancellor of Lombardy–Venetia to restore the Austrian rule while taking over Northern Italy's administration. But only a few months later, Ficquelmont was recalled to Vienna to assume the leadership of the Council of war as the Revolutions of 1848 started.
Archduke Rainer's mistakes as well as the lack of understanding between Rainer and Feldmarschall Graf Radetzky, were blamed for the disasters of the Italian Revolution of 1848.[2]
Heinrich (9 May 1828 – 30 November 1891), Feldmarschalleutnant
Maximilian (16 January 1830 – 16 March 1839) – died in childhood
The Revolution of 1848 forced Rainer and Elisabeth from the court at Milan; when the insurrection was quelled, Radetzky was named Rainer's successor as Viceroy. Although his children, except Adelheid, are buried in the Imperial Crypt in Vienna, he and his wife are buried at the Maria Himmelfahrtskirche in Bolzano.
Through his daughter Adelaide, Rainer is an ancestor of the entire royal family of Italy which reigned from 1861 to 1946.
^George R. Marek, The Eagles Die. Franz Joseph, Elisabeth, and Their Austria, pp. 41–42. New York: Harper & Row, 1974. This mild form of epilepsy was also suffered by Archduke Karl and his son, Archduke Albrecht, both of whom were able military commanders.
^Joan Haslip, The Crown of Mexico, pp. 22, 89, 109. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971.
^Robert Adolf Kann, A History of the Habsburg Empire 1526–1918, pp. 328, 331. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974.
^Alan Palmer, Twilight of the Habsburgs. The Life and Times of Emperor Francis Joseph, pp. 122–123. New York: Grove Press, 1994.
Generations are numbered by male-line descent from the first archdukes. Later generations are included although Austrian titles of nobility were abolished in 1919.
Generations are numbered from the children of Francesco de' Medici, first Grand Duke of Tuscany. Later generations are included but the grand duchy was abolished in 1860.