At “descent” intervals

I think I have this right.  Maximiliano von Götzen-Iturbide is the great-great- great-great-grandson of … this guy:

Agustín Itubide … a rather dashing Mexican officer who, in may 1821 switched sides in the Mexican War of Independence, going over to the Insurgents in a plan that would give Mexico independence from Spain… but under a Catholic Monarchy.  The Catholic Monarchs being rather dubious of the whole idea, Iturbide decided HE was the Emperor and was crowned (such as it was) on 19 May 1822.

Other than Iturbide, no one seemed to cotton to the idea, so Iturbide … er.. Emperor Agustín, spent most of his ten month reign dickering for a decent pension in return for going into exile.  That was worked out… with the understanding that “we don’t need no stinkin’ monarchs” and — if ex-Emp Auggie came back, he’d be shot.

In 1828 he came back.  And was shot.  He hasn’t looked good since.

Agustín’s younger son, Angel,  not particularly in the Princess market, married a plain old gringa named Alice Green.  Their son Agustín was kidnapped by Angel’s sisters (who tossed in a 14 year old cousin named Salvador Iturbide into the deal) … and sold the kids as heirs to “royal house” to  this guy…

Of course, Max the First and Last, like Agustín the First and last, didn’t quite understand how serious the Mexicans were when they said he’d be shot.  He was.  Empress Carlota had left the country before Max went to the firing squad and sort of forget about young Agustín.  Which maybe is just as well, considering she was completely insane.  Somehow young Agustín ended up pretty much on his feet, and semi-normal…  becoming first a Mexican army officer then a professor of foreign languages at Georgetown University. He did have to deal with the nonsense of being considered heir to a non-existent throne and having the title “Prince”.

Salvador had somehow ended up marrying some Hungarian titled lady, and was more or less treated as a minor prince in the Austria-Hungarian Empire (he got paid for it, anyway).

The Professor formerly known as Prince never had children.  He died in 1925 (while Carlota was still living… if you can call it that), and even though the whole nonsensical Austria-Hungarian Empire itself had expired in 1918, SOMEBODY had to take over the fiction of being Emperor of Mexico.  So..

Salvador had been dead for thirty years, but he did have a daughter, María Josepha Sophia Iturbide… who was smart enough to stay out of the whole “Mexican Empire” nonsense, but… unfortunately for her, not the royalist stuff.  She was imprisoned in 1949 in Romania as an “unrepentant monarchist” and died the same year (probably just of normal causes, but not for sure… we are talking about a family history of premature politicide).

Seeing the “throne” (or whatever you want to call it) seems to skip a generation between heirs, it was natural that María Josepha left the title in her will to the guy in the other red suit, with more bling than the old Pope:  Maximiliano von Götzen-Iturbide… who, if he’s smart, probably wants to stay out of Mexico.

Max von… etc…. is an Australian (not Austrian) resident or citizen, though I don’t think he wears that fancy jacket with the bling around Perth.  I was wondering what it was:   the article from which I took some of the photos (and some of my snarky royal history) in Excelsior (Juan Pablo Reyes, “México tiene ‘familia imperial'”) had the photo of Max II and Ben XIV labeled as having been taken in 2011, suggesting Max II was received by Ben as a fellow monarch… which might have been a problem.  However, I found the same photo, from a July 2008 photograph of the Knights of Malta … membership in which is one of the perks(?) of “nobility”