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Guided tour

The House of Habsburg in five people.

Eighteen generations are a lot to navigate. Here are five people through whom the House of Habsburg becomes understandable — from the rise through the world empire to a united Europe. Each entry links directly into the graph.

  1. Porträt von Maximilian I

    01 · 1459–1519

    Maximilian I

    The last knight and the first strategist

    Maximilian I married Mary of Burgundy and fused the Habsburgs with the richest court in Europe. From this single marriage grew a dynasty that, two generations later, ruled half the known world.

    He called himself „the last knight". In the Habsburg graph he is the hinge from which Charles V — and everything that follows — first becomes possible.

    Explore in the demo →
  2. Porträt von Charles V

    02 · 1500–1558

    Charles V

    The empire on which the sun never set

    Four grandparents from four dynasties — Habsburg, Burgundy, Trastámara, Avis. Charles V inherited Spain, Burgundy, the Netherlands, the Holy Roman Empire, and with the conquest of America an entire continent.

    The Habsburg graph makes visible what no history book can: why one person could simultaneously be King of Castile, Emperor, Lord of the Netherlands, and son of the Burgundian house. All the lines converge in him.

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  3. Porträt von Maria Theresa

    03 · 1717–1780

    Maria Theresa

    The only one

    She wasn't supposed to rule. Salic law excluded women from the throne; her father Charles VI had to fight the Pragmatic Sanction through half of Europe just to let her reign.

    She reigned for forty years. Reformed administration, taxation, schools, healthcare. Bore sixteen children, among them Joseph II and Marie Antoinette. In the graph she's the axis between the old Habsburg empire and the modern Austria that emerges after.

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  4. Porträt von Franz Joseph I

    04 · 1830–1916

    Franz Joseph I

    Sixty-eight years on the throne

    Began his reign in 1848 at eighteen, in the middle of a revolution. Ended it in 1916, in the middle of the war that finally dissolved his monarchy.

    In between: Solferino, Königgrätz, Mexico, Mayerling, Sissi in Geneva, Sarajevo. Six decades of European history mirrored in a single biography. The graph's timeline lays them side by side — what he lived through while his empire fell apart around him.

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  5. Porträt von Otto von Habsburg

    05 · 1912–2011

    Otto von Habsburg

    From heir apparent to Member of the European Parliament

    Son of the last Emperor, born into exile. Otto could have claimed the throne — instead he became the most vocal advocate of European unification.

    Served over twenty years in the European Parliament. Witnessed personally the transition from the multinational state of Austria-Hungary to the European Union. In the graph the arc closes with him: from empire to republic, from monarchy to united Europe.

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Explore the whole graph

These five are a beginning. The Habsburg graph connects 294 people across 18 generations — with life events, places, kinship paths and the historical timeline that shows what was happening in the world during their lives.

Open the Habsburg graph →
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