Van wie was Anna Nahowski?

Anna Nahowski, geb. Novak (Wenen, 1860 - aldaar 1931) was van 1875 tot 1888 de maîtresse van de Oostenrijkse keizer Frans Jozef I.

Anna en de keizer leerden elkaar kennen toen beiden aan het wandelen waren in het park bij slot Schönbrunn. "U wandelt er stevig op los", zou de keizer tegen haar gezegd hebben. Vanaf dat moment begon een relatie, die ten dele samenviel met de tweede langdurige buitenechtelijke relatie van de keizer, die met Katharina Schratt.

Anna en haar gezin - ze was getrouwd en woonde vlak bij het slot Schönbrunn - werden schatrijk van de verhouding. De keizer overlaadde haar met kostbare geschenken en gaf het gezin ook zeer stevige financiële ondersteuning.. De keizer, die zeer matineus was, bezocht Anna meestal om een uur of vijf 's ochtends, wanneer hij onopgemerkt naar haar huis kon wandelen. De heer Nahowski zorgde er dan voor het huis te hebben verlaten.

Na het drama van Mayerling kwam er een einde aan de relatie, ook omdat Katharina Schratt een belangrijker positie in het leven van de keizer had gekregen.

Men gaat ervan uit dat Frans Jozef de vader van ten minste twee kinderen van Anna is. De zangeres Helene Nahowski, echtgenote van de componist Alban Berg, was een van hen. De andere, Frank geheten, sneed ter gelegenheid van de honderdste geboortedag van de keizer in 1930 een vinger van zijn hand en legde die op het graf van Frans Jozef. Hij werd vervolgens in een psychiatrische kliniek ondergebracht.

In 1986 werd haar dagboek gepubliceerd.

Franz Joseph I or Francis Joseph I (German: Franz Joseph Karl [fʁants ˈjoːzɛf ˈkaʁl]; Hungarian: Ferenc József Károly [ˈfɛrɛnt͡s ˈjoːʒɛf ˈkaːroj]; 18 August 1830 – 21 November 1916) was Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, and the ruler of the other states of the Habsburg monarchy from 2 December 1848 until his death in 1916. In the early part of his reign, his realms and territories were referred to as the Austrian Empire, but in 1867 they were reconstituted as the dual monarchy of Austria-Hungary. From 1 May 1850 to 24 August 1866, he was also president of the German Confederation.

In December 1848, Franz Joseph's uncle Emperor Ferdinand I abdicated the throne at Olomouc, as part of Minister President Felix zu Schwarzenberg's plan to end the Hungarian Revolution of 1848. Franz Joseph then acceded to the throne. In 1854, he married his first cousin Duchess Elisabeth in Bavaria, with whom he had four children: Sophie, Gisela, Rudolf, and Marie Valerie. Largely considered to be a reactionary, Franz Joseph spent his early reign resisting constitutionalism in his domains. The Austrian Empire was forced to cede its influence over Tuscany and most of its claim to Lombardy–Venetia to the Kingdom of Sardinia, following the Second Italian War of Independence in 1859 and the Third Italian War of Independence in 1866. Although Franz Joseph ceded no territory to the Kingdom of Prussia after the Austrian defeat in the Austro-Prussian War, the Peace of Prague (23 August 1866) settled the German Question in favour of Prussia, which prevented the unification of Germany from occurring under the House of Habsburg.

Franz Joseph was troubled by nationalism throughout his reign. He concluded the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, which granted greater autonomy to Hungary and created the dual monarchy of Austria-Hungary. He ruled peacefully for the next 45 years, but personally suffered the tragedies of the execution of his brother Emperor Maximilian I of Mexico in 1867, the suicide of his son Rudolf in 1889, and the assassinations of his wife Elisabeth in 1898 and his nephew and heir presumptive, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, in 1914.

After the Austro-Prussian War, Austria-Hungary turned its attention to the Balkans, which was a hotspot of international tension because of conflicting interests of Austria with not only the Ottoman but also the Russian Empire. The Bosnian Crisis was a result of Franz Joseph's annexation in 1908 of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which had already been occupied by his troops since the Congress of Berlin (1878). On 28 June 1914, the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo resulted in Austria-Hungary's declaration of war against the Kingdom of Serbia, which was an ally of the Russian Empire. This activated a system of alliances declaring war on each other, which resulted in World War I. Franz Joseph died in 1916, after ruling his domains for almost 68 years. He was succeeded by his grandnephew Charles I & IV.