Curt Jester
Banned
[A Portrait of King Maximilian I of Lombardy-Venetia]
Prologue
"Our biggest regrets are not for the things we have done but for the things we haven't done."
"You think that I would sink that low? Are you mad? I am the King of Prussia, not some lowly duke. I will not touch a crown smeared with the hussy smell of revolution!" Those were the words spoken by King Frederick William IV when the Frankfurt Parliament had offered him the chance at an empire. Shortly afterwards he stormed out very dramatically, disappointing the revolutionaries.
The members of the Parliament, a group that most would call illegitimate, knew there was a low chance of Frederick accepting their offer to become the first ever German Emperor, forming a nation of ethnic Germans on par with France or Russia. The brown nosed Prussians had been dealing with power far beyond their own for long, lifting above their weight, they didn't realize it wouldn't last forever. A Prussian first and a German second, that lot were. And it's because of that very pompous attitude that the offer to become German Emperor had fell next to Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria. [I.] Franz was honored, and dispatched diplomats to the major German states, asking if they'd be willing to join in this union. He didn't want to do anything rash until he knew for sure that this Empire would hold together. While the Parliament had many powerful and influential figures, only the lords of Germany themselves could uphold it. The constitution had all states keeping their rulers and prestige, but under an Emperor, and as a combined state. The King of Württemberg agreed, and so did Austria's long time ally in Bavaria, but with the stipulation that the capital is not Vienna, but Frankfurt or another city more central in Germany instead. The King of Saxony sent back a diplomat agreeing as well (but of course, at this point, the King of Saxony had lost 40% of his land to the Prussians). But Austria was a different challenge than Prussia altogether. Austria itself was a proud German state, but it's Empire was largely a multicultural one, encompassing Germans and a dozen different Slavic races on a good day. The Parliament did not like that: their goal was to create a German nation, not a multicultural one. It left quite a task on young Franz Joseph, deciding whether or not to dismantle the current Empire to create a new one. The Austrian Empire was a familiar courtyard; this new German Empire was full of unexpected turns and unfamiliar opportunities. And Austria was different from the rest of Germany; it always viewed itself as Austrian, moreso than Prussians thought of themselves as Prussian. Austria had always been proud of it's special place as the central holding of the strongest dynasty in Europe and perhaps rightly so. While all of it's rivals were elevated to Kingdoms, Austria remained a mere Archduchy - but the people of Austria thought of the Archduchy to be beyond most Kingdoms. Yes, it left quite a conundrum for Franz Joseph to figure out. His mother, Archduchess Sophia, on the other hand, had already made up her mind.
"My dearest son, think of it! You cannot let this opportunity pass!" The Archduchess was very excited about the idea of her own son as the German Emperor, and would not let him miss out on the chance to be the founder of a new legacy, one even greater than their own. "You would be the one ushering in a new age! A new era!"
"But Mother!" Franz Joseph rubbed his temples, tired of repeating the same arguments. He felt as if he was a ghost, doomed to continue to go through the motions forever. "We cannot dismantle our legacy, our Empire!"
"Our legacy is that of the Holy Roman Empire." Sophia smiled widely, reminiscing on the past as if she'd been there herself. "Our family led the minor states for hundreds of years, guiding them and protecting them. And this is our chance to restore that power!"
"What of the Empire, though! Not that Empire, but our Empire? Admit that it is a lost cause and give them all independence, like those damned revolutionaries want? Create a total power vacuum?" Franz sighed and stood up, pacing back and forth through out the dining room. "This is our land that we have conquered over years and years of marriages and war! This is who we are!"
"Sit back down, dear, remember your manners." He did as she said; even as an Emperor, he was still obedient to his mother. "No, dearest, of course not. We will do what we have done in the past, when needed. We will do what Emperor Maximilian and King Ferdinand once did. We will divide our lands amongst ourselves. We will set up your brothers as independent lords of these side realms. We will give into the demands of these revolutionaries - indeed they will have their wanted independence. But it will be under the guiding hand of our family. Europe has always needed our family to guide them, and that will not stop now. Our Empire will continue in all but name, and this way we not only maintain our Empire, but we will rule all of central Europe!"
The young Emperor saw the logic in that. "You're right, that is the wisest thing to do."
"Of course i'm right dear. I'm your mother, and mothers always know what is best. Even the mothers of Emperors." She tapped her chin. "Especially the mothers of Emperors."
"It is not for nothing that the Archduchess Sophia is known as the Mother of Europe. Her dividing the Habsburg lands not only led to the foundation of the German Empire, but the four states that came out of it laid the foundation for our great European Brotherhood. She had remarkable foresight indeed." - Joachim Vanderwald, Diamonds and Divination: Biography of the Mother of Europe
Archduchess Sophia was a cunning woman, indeed, one with quite the gift for seeing the future. She wanted nothing but the greatest for her sons, and knew each and every one of them was destined for magnificence! Her own son being the one to bring in a golden age of central Europe.. it wasn't something she would let slip through her - or his - fingers. It took several more days of debating, but in the end, Sophia won the argument, as she always did. And she had some good points; the year before was a daunting one on the Habsburgs, with the so called 'Spring of Revolutions'. Many of the minority groups in the Empire were tired of being subservient to Vienna, and this seemed a decent way to give the people what they wanted without dismembering the Habsburg's hold on central Europe. And so on April 20th, Franz Joseph returned to the Parliament, and was crowned Franz I, German Emperor, marking a new era as a German state was born. Soon after, on April 29th, Franz Joseph announced what would be called the Proclamation of Prague, separating the Austrian Empire into four crowns. Franz I, German Emperor remained as Archduke of Austria and King of Bohemia. His youngest brother, Ludwig Viktor, would be named King of Croatia, with his mother, the Archduchess herself, as regent until he came of age. His brother Karl Ludwig would be named King of Greater Hungary and rule over Hungary and Galicia, with his uncle, Palatine Stephen of Hungary, serving as his regent until he came of age. [II.] And his other brother, Ferdinand Maximilian, was more than happy to take up the reins as King of Lombardy-Venetia, the Italian provinces of the Habsburg Empire. Indeed, the liberal young man was ready to make his own mark upon the world. And while the Empire had been dismantled, the Habsburgs had survived the Spring of Revolutions in one piece - and now it was time for a changing of the seasons.
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You hit the nail on the head though, the Savoys are shaking in their loafers ATM. However, Austria/Germany isn't a totally stable state yet, and there are still issues with it that need to be resolved. (And by 'issues' I mean Hohenzollerns.)
