NEWP: 1699 Austria Royal Wedding Medal by Müller

Zohar · February 3, 2018 12:32AM

While I was being shot down on every bid at Kunker's auction, I was presented with this spectacular medal which I had to respond to even though it may be some time before I see it in hand. Very scarce it seems as I could barely find a comparable. Engraving and originality are spectacular. Will research some more when I find the time.

Background: Joseph I was married off at an early age to Amalia Wilhelmina of Brunswick-Lüneburg (1673–1742), daughter of Duke Johann Friedrich of Brunswick-Calenberg, an important ally of the Habsburgs in northern Germany. The union resulted from dynastic considerations. The wedding to place on 24 February 1699 in Vienna. They had three children and their only son died of hydrocephalus before his first birthday. Joseph had a passion for love affairs (none of which resulted in illegitimate children) and he caught a sexually transmittable disease, probably syphilis, which he passed on to his wife while they were trying to produce a new heir. This incident rendered her sterile. Their father, who was still alive during these events, made Joseph and his brother Charles sign the Mutual Pact of Succession, ensuring that Joseph's daughters would have absolute precedence over Charles's daughters, neither of whom was born at the time, and that Maria Josepha would inherit both the Austrian and Spanish realms. After Joseph’s death at an early age in 1711 his young widow at first attempted to lobby in her daughters’ interests, making her position in Vienna very difficult under the rule of her brother-in-law Charles, who was attempting to establish the succession of his daughter Maria Theresa. Later she withdrew from the court, spending the rest of her life in the Convent of the Salesian Sisters on Vienna’s Rennweg.

1699 Joseph I (1705-1711) Medal by P. H. Müller. 44mm, 29.86gr. Commemorating Joseph I's wedding with Amalia Wilhelmina von Braunschweig u. Calenberg. Mont: 1277, Coll. Julius 570.

harasha · February 3, 2018 4:01AM

Congratulations on the Müller medal. I particularly like that medallist, but usually am, as you put it, "shot down." But, then, I think you know that.