Secret Lives of Royal Women by Marlene Wagman-Geller

Author:Marlene Wagman-Geller
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Mango Media
Published: 2022-09-30T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 21

“Bury You All”

1926

To be labeled eccentric—rather than crazy—used to be a prerogative of those with blood blue enough to allow them the privilege of straying from the straight and narrow. As writer Edith Sitwell explained, “The genius and the aristocrat are frequently regarded as eccentrics because genius and aristocrat are entirely unafraid of and uninfluenced by the opinions and vagaries of the crowd.” If you were posh enough, you could get a pass for any shenanigans. Spain’s last duchess took full advantage of her highborn station to do whatever the hell she pleased.

Known as Cayetana—short for María del Rosario Cayetana Alfonsa Victoria Eugenia Francisca Fitz-James Stuart y de Silva, to provide but a few of her twenty-three names—the Duchess was among the most intriguing and unorthodox of Europe’s royals. Cayetana was born in her family’s neoclassical Palacio de Liria in Madrid—the home where her ancestor had served as Goya’s muse—the only child of Don Jacobo Fitz-James Stuart y Falcó, seventeenth Duke of Alba. Through paternal lineage, Cayetana was a descendant of King James II of England, making her a distant relative of Winston Churchill and Diana, Princess of Wales. Her mother was Doña Maria del Rosario de Silva y Gurtubay, the ninth Marquesa of San Vincente del Barco. King Alfonso XII and Victoria Eugenie, his English queen, were her godparents. Due to Cayetana’s fifty-seven titles—The Guinness Book of World Records lists her as holding the greatest number—she was not required to bow to anyone, not even King Juan Carlos of Spain, Queen Elizabeth II of England, or the pope. Another perk of her pedigree was she had the right to ride a horse into Seville Cathedral.

And yet Cayetana’s childhood did not bring her as many joys as the number of her names or titles. She hardly saw her mother, who suffered from tuberculosis and died from the disease when her daughter was eight. Further upheaval followed when Generalissimo Francisco Franco appointed her father ambassador to England, where she socialized with her poor relations, the Churchills, and Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret. In 1943, while Britain was in the grip of wartime austerity, the dazzling duchess made her debut in what the Associated Press described as “the biggest social affair the European Continent has seen in many years.” The Anglican sojourn ended after the Duke resigned his ambassadorship in 1945, declaring that Franco was “harmful to the interests of Spain.” The Albas returned to Liria Palace, which had been the target of German bombs during the Spanish Civil War as communists commandeered the estate. The Duke had possessed the foresight to store his priceless collections of paintings in the cellars of the Prado; however, half of its literary collection perished.

In 1947, Cayetana wed Luis Martínez de Irujo y Artázcoz, son of the Duke of Sotomayor, in an affair so lavish that it threatened to eclipse Princess Elizabeth’s marriage to Philip Mountbatten the following month. Their nuptials took place in Seville Cathedral with a thousand guests in attendance, in an event The New York Times heralded as the most expensive wedding in the world.

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