Archduk :: Royal Family :: Habsburg´s Fatalism

“A fatalism symbolised in legend by flying crows with bloody beaks. The strange suicide of Crown Prince Rudolf and Mary Vetsera at Mayerling; The disappearance of Johann Orth (his younger brother) off the volcanic coast of Patagonia; the execution of Emperor Maximilian in Mexico; the life of Sisi, like a frenetic escape on horseback, extinguished only by the crime of an anarchist; (the accidental death of his beloved Mathilda); and the suicidal insanity of Ludwig of Bavaria at Lake Starnberg. These are just some of the shadows of the Danubian tapestry that rips like a whirlwind of death, and whose epicentre is the fall of the Empire.”

Prologue of Llop, J.C., Pavana para un Archiduque difunto, in March Cencillo, J., El Archiduque, Biografía ilustrada de un príncipe nómada, La Foradada, 1991.