A Real "Sisi Princess": Beauty and Sorrow

Author: Guo Huan (Compiler)
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-07-01
Features: In the 19th century, Europe had an Austrian Empire, with an emperor named Franz Joseph. When he was crowned in 1848, he was only 18 years old. He ruled for 68 years, personally experiencing the agonizing pain of an empire's decline and collapse. In 1853, at the age of 23, the emperor visited Bavaria to see his cousin and fiancée, Helene, but fell in love with Helene's sister, Sisi. Eight months later, Sisi stood at the altar in Vienna and became "Her Majesty the Queen," beginning her "caged" life in the Viennese court. Actor Romi Schneider portrayed the real life of Empress Sisi more authentically than reality itself.
Starting from 1278, Rudolf IV of the Habsburg family (later Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf I) defeated Ottokar II of the Premyslid family, marking the beginning of the Habsburg family's 640-year rule over Austria and establishing a central kingdom centered around Austria, Bohemia, and Hungary. The Napoleonic Wars in the early 19th century led to the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire and the establishment of the Austrian Empire. After being defeated by Prussia in 1866, the Austro-Hungarian Empire was forced to split the next year in March, forming a dual monarchy called the "Austro-Hungarian Empire." After World War I, the empire collapsed and was divided into several independent countries, with Austria becoming one of them as an independent republic. In 1938, Hitler annexed this republic, and after World War II ended in 1945, it was restored as a republic but remained occupied by the Allied forces until 1955.