House of savoy

The patrimonial possessions were originally located in Savoy, the Chamber City was considered Chambery . The first historically reliable representative of the Humbert (Umbert) clan I Beloruky (970/980 - July 19, 1047/1051), Count of Salmuranc (in Viennoy) in 1003, Count of Nyon in 1018 and Count of Aosta in 1023. He was close to King Arelat Rudolph III . He then supported the successor of Rudolph, Emperor Conrad II . In 1033, Humbert subordinated Bishop Morien, who, relying on the adversary of Emperor Ed II de Blois , tried to achieve independence. As a reward, Conrad gave Humbert part of the abolished bishopric, called the county of Savoy (comes in agro Savojensi), receiving the title of Count de Morien. Later, he further increased his possessions.

The son of Humbert I, Ed (Otton), through a marriage made in 1050 with Adelheida, daughter and heiress of Manfred, Margrave of Turins , received Piedmont. His successors in the struggle between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines were permanent allies of the emperors. They managed to somewhat expand their hereditary possessions both in Italy and in Switzerland.

Count Pierre II (d. 1268) annexed to Savoy Vaud . Under his nephews Thomas III and Amadeus V, Piedmont and Savoy split. Amadeus V was later elevated to the rank of imperial prince. In 1388, Amadeus VII (1383-1391) annexed the county of Nice to Savoy. His son Amadeus VIII in 1416 received the title of Duke of Savoy from the Emperor Sigismund.

In 1418, the Piedmont branch died out, and Piedmont reunited with Savoy. In 1422, the emperor granted flax to the Duke of Savoy the county of Genoa . In 1434, Amadeus VIII resigned; five years later, he was elected pope under the name of Felix V, but in 1449 recanted the tiara. His son Louis (1434-1465) established by law the inseparability of Savoy and Piedmont.

In the years 1530-1536, under Duke Charles III , Savoy lost Geneva , Vaadt and other possessions in Switzerland. In 1536, the French, covering themselves with the rights of Louise of Savoy , occupied Turin during the war with Emperor Charles V , then almost all of Piedmont and Savoy. Only in 1559, Emanuel Philibert , son of Charles III, managed to regain his clan possessions, except for some fortresses that were returned to him later. His administration can be considered the end of the feudal system and the beginning of enlightened absolutism.

To protect the center of possessions from attacks by the French, he moved the capital of the duchy to Turin. His son Karl Emanuel I (1580-1630), ambitious and restless, involved the country in numerous wars, especially with France. Duke Victor Amadeus II in the war for the Spanish inheritance first joined Louis XIV , then (1703) went over to the side of Austria . As a result, almost all of his state was occupied by the French, and only the victory of Eugene of Savoy under Turin (1706) restored his power.

In the Utrecht world of 1713, Victor Amadeus II received Montferrat , a significant part of the duchy of Milan and the kingdom of Sicily . Instead of Sicily, which was conquered by the Spaniards in 1718, under the London Treaty, he received the island of Sardinia , transferred by the Austrians in August 1720, while retaining the royal title. Since then, Savoy, Piedmont and Sardinia constituted a single Sardinian kingdom .

The senior line of the House of Savoy died out in 1831. Karl Albert of the Carinha branch, descended from Thomas , the younger brother of Victor Amadeus I , Duke of Savoy (1630-1637), became the king. In 1860, Carl Albert’s son, King Victor Emmanuel II , in reward for joining his kingdom of Parma, Tuscany, Modena and Romagna, ceded France to Savoy, along with Nice.

In 1861, he became king of a united Italy . The year before, the monarch presented the picture gallery of the House of Savoy collected by generations of his ancestors as a gift to the nation.

On the throne of a united Italian kingdom

After the death of Victor Emmanuel II in 1878, his son Umberto I became the second king of Italy, and after Umberto, who died in 1900 at the hands of the anarchist, his son Victor Emmanuel III became the third king of Italy.

Starting in 1922, the value of Victor Emanuel III became purely nominal, since the real power, not without his help, passed to the Nazis , led by Benito Mussolini . The propaganda of the times of fascism frankly pushed the reigning emperor generally beyond all bounds: his photographs were replaced with portraits of the Duce, shots with his participation were cut from films, etc. The king never objected to the decisions of the fascist government, did nothing to protect the courtiers devoted to him and officers subjected to reprisal (including racially after 1938). This humiliation of the king sharply negatively affected the prestige of the dynasty . In 1936, after the capture of Ethiopia ( Second Italo-Ethiopian War ), he was proclaimed emperor of Ethiopia; in 1939 - the king of Albania ( these titles did not receive full international recognition ). In 1938, the king and Mussolini were awarded the title of First Marshals of the Empire .

In 1943, as the Allied forces approached Rome , the king supported the decision of the Great Fascist Council to remove and arrest the Duce. The king abandoned the Ethiopian and Albanian titles and from that time supported the allies. After a new German offensive and their occupation of Rome, in the same year he fled to Egypt .

On May 9, 1946, Victor Emmanuel III officially abdicated in favor of his son Umberto II . However, according to some, the monarchy was compromised by cooperation with the fascist dictatorship, as a result of which, on June 12, 1946, after a referendum on the abolition of the monarchy, Umberto II was deposed and forced to go into exile, having reigned 33 days (for which he was nicknamed the “May King”).

On this the story of the Savoy dynasty as a reigning house ended. According to the Constitution of the Italian Republic, members of the male dynasty and their wives are not eligible to be elected and are not allowed access to the national territory of Italy .

Outside Italy

Some of the representatives of the Savoy dynasty reigned in other countries. Among them:

• Amadeus I - the short-term king of Spain in 1871-1873.
• His grandson, Tomislav II - in 1941-1943 the nominal king of the so-called. The independent state of Croatia , created by Italy and Germany on most of the territory of modern Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina . During his “reign” he never visited the kingdom “subservient” to him.

In addition, the representative of the House of Savoy was the famous Austrian commander and statesman of the XVII-XVIII centuries Evgeny of Savoy (1663-1736) - he was the great-grandson of the Duke of Savoy Karl Emmanuel I.

After the death of King Levon V of the Lusignan dynasty, through dynastic marriages and inheritance of titles, from 1485 the title of King of Armenia passed to the House of Savoy. So, in the full title of Victor Emanuel II, Armenia is also listed: “By the grace of God and the will of the people, the King of Italy, the King of Sardinia, Cyprus, Jerusalem, Armenia.”

Residences of Savoy Monarchs

In 1997, UNESCO decided to include in the list of World Heritage Sites of the House of Savoy in Turin and its environs (14 objects), of which the following can be distinguished:

• Palazzo Reale
• Palazzo Madama
• Palazzo carignano
• Valentino Castle
• Racconigi Castle
• Castle in Moncalieri
• Stupinigi

House Branches

• Piedmontese . Ancestor - Thomas III (1199-1259), Prince of Piedmont from 1259. Faded in 1318.
• In The ancestor is Louis I (1250-1302), Prince Vaud. Faded in 1350.
• Nemurskaya . Ancestor - Philip (1490-1533), Duke de Nemours . Faded in 1659.
• Carignan . The ancestor is Thomas (1595-1656), Prince Carignana. There is currently. Aosta (existing today), Genoese (extinct in the male generation in 1996) and Soissons (extinct in 1734) branches were separated from it.

• Fondation for Medieval Genealogy: House of Savoy
• Miroslav Marek's website: House of Savoy
• Official website of the Duke of Aosta
• Official website of the Prince of Naples
• Ordini Dinastici della Real Casa Savoia
• Brief history of the House with a picture of coat-of-arms
• Genealogy of recent members of the House
• Titles of the rulers of Savoy and Sardinia