The World of King Kristina: Henry Woodhead on Kristina's hatred of marriage and refusal to marry, on her interest in celibacy, and on her many foreign suitors

Sunday, October 19, 2025

Henry Woodhead on Kristina's hatred of marriage and refusal to marry, on her interest in celibacy, and on her many foreign suitors

Source:

Memoirs of Christina, Queen of Sweden, volume 1, pages 192 to 199, by Henry Woodhead, 1863; original at the University of Michigan

https://books.google.com/books?id=XI02AAAAMAAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&dq=maria+euphrosyne&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Kristina's letter to King Charles II of England, written sometime in the early 1650s, is here:

https://kingkristina.blogspot.com/2020/05/kristinas-letter-to-king-charles-ii-of.html

The account:

... She undoubtedly overrated De la Gardie's abilities, although they were by no means contemptible; and his descent from two of the greatest families in Sweden naturally gave him considerable importance. It was commonly believed that her judgment was blinded by love. However this might be, De la Gardie's marriage with her cousin took place when he returned to Sweden, after an absence of about a year.

Various stories were told which were more or less improbable, but they all hinted at love conquered by duty in the breast of Christina.

It was said that she would have married Magnus herself, if the Chancellor had not secretly traduced poor Ebba Brahe, and whispered that the young Count was really the son of Gustavus Adolphus. It is most unlikely that Oxenstiern should have told a dishonourable falsehood which cast a slur on his own order, and it is still more improbable that the report should have been true of the high-minded lady who refused to marry a king when she found that his moral conduct was not so spotless as the rest of his character. It was also reported that, at the celebration of the marriage, Christina said to her cousin, "I give you one I may not take myself."

There were[,] of course[,] numerous suitors who endeavoured to win the great heiress of the north, and her subjects were naturally anxious that she should marry to secure the succession.

In 1647, the order of ecclesiastics sent her an address, informing her that celibacy was an inconvenient and dangerous thing, and recommending her to marry.

Although at one time she appeared to waver, her disinclination for matrimony increased after she had begun to taste the sweets of undivided power.

When she was only nine years old, she heard for the first time the doctrine of the Catholic Church, that the unmarried state was the most meritorious. "Ah", remarked the child, "how fine that is! I will be of that religion."

When she was twenty-two years old, she performed in one of the masks which were then fashionable. She chose the part of Diana, and broke Cupid's bow and arrows to pieces. She continued proud of her independence, or affected to be so, to the end of her life, for one of her last medals, struck at Rome, represented a Phœnix, with the inscription, "I was born, lived, and died free."

In her life of herself, or, as it may rather be called, her confession, she says, "I was born in such a rank, that I might have chosen any man most to my taste, for there was no one in the world who would not have thought himself happy if I had chosen to give him my hand. If I had felt any weakness I should have married like so many others. I would not have had that invincible aversion to marriage, of which I have given such remarkable proofs, if it had been necessary for me."

When it was represented to her that it was dangerous for the kingdom to be left without a recognized successor after her death, and she was urged on that account to marry, she told her advisers that it was as likely she might be the mother of a Nero as of an Augustus.

Two of her suitors were the two sons of the King of Denmark. Ulrick was killed in the Thirty Years' War, and his brother Frederick succeeded to his pretensions. These pretensions were worth very little, as Christina did not listen to them, and the Swedish aristocracy would never have permitted such an alliance. In this case, as in several others, the hope of winning her hand was the means of deferring war.

The Danes did not wish to lose a chance of reuniting the Northern Crowns, and therefore refrained from joining the Imperialists at a critical time. The hope of obtaining the young heiress also made the policy of Frederick William of Brandenburg more favourable to Sweden.

He had been encouraged by Gustavus Adolphus to aspire to his daughter's hand, and he was formally proposed by the Council when she was fourteen years old. The Oxenstierns were not in favour of an alliance which might have revived the influence of the Queen Dowager, and they also feared that Christina might remain in Germany, and treat Sweden as an appendage. Many thought that the couple were too high-spirited to agree, but Frederick William cherished hopes until Christina attained her majority, when he was definitively refused, and an end thus put to the design of Gustavus Adolphus for the command of the Baltic.

Germany furnished several other visitors. The Archduke Leopold of Austria proposed to end the long strife between the two countries by a matrimonial alliance.

The Elector Palatine, Charles Louis, hoped that his house might regain by love what it had lost by war. A prince of Saxony wished to renew an alliance which his family had violated so treacherously, and to receive the hand of Christina as the reward. Ferdinand, King of Hungary, also tried his chance, but met with no encouragement. Her three Polish cousins all proposed for Christina, and although their father, Sigismund, still called himself King of Sweden, they were not the least ardent of her lovers. Their names were Uladislaus, John Casimir, and Casimir Sigismund. The second of these was a Jesuit and a Cardinal, but he undertook to get the necessary dispensation from Rome.

He afterwards became King of Poland, and his career, in one respect, resembled that of Christina, for he also abdicated his throne. Neither of them would probably have done so if they had been united, and the bloody war between Sweden and Poland, which occupied their successors, might have been averted.

Philip IV., of Spain, must be added to the list of wooers. Unlike his ancestor of the same name, he showed no jealousy of his son. He even offered the hand of Don John, in case Christina should prefer a younger man than himself. Such avowed indifference for her person, so long as her inheritance could be secured, was not a likely way to win the young Queen. It was suspected at the time that the Spanish proposals were not sincere, but were merely intended to raise some differences between Sweden and France. Rosenhaue [sic], the Swedish envoy at Madrid, viewed them in this light, and said, jocosely, the first condition was that the King of Spain must become a good Lutheran.

Charles II., at that time a fugitive, with little hope of mounting the English throne, was anxious to gain a share of the Northern crown. He sent the Chevalier Balandin to ascertain if his proposals would have any chance of success. By way of introducing the subject, and in the hope of captivating Christina, Charles sent her his portrait; but the result was so little satisfactory, that he wisely avoided the mortification of a direct refusal by abstaining from making a positive offer. Christina wrote a letter to Charles, in which she mentioned an application from him, which had been handed to her by Balandin, but it does not appear to refer to the offer of marriage. It mentions some request he had made, probably an application for assistance, which she politely declines to grant.