Marriages and Children
In 1925 at the age of eighteen Maria Pia married Francesco Javier Bilbao y Batista, a Cuban playboy twenty years her senior. He came from a rich family of cattle breeders. Since Bilbao was divorced, the marriage was a civil one only and took place in the Cuban embassy in Paris. They had one daughter, Fátima Francisca Xaviera Iris Bilbao de Saxe-Coburgo Gotha e Bragança, in 1932, but she was reportedly developmentally disabled.
Maria Pia lived briefly with Bilbao in Cuba, before returning to Spain. Bilbao died November 15, 1935. Francisca died unmarried in 1982.
To escape the Spanish Civil War, Maria Pia moved with her mother to Rome. In 1939 she married Giuseppe Manlio Blais, a general in the Italian carabinieri. At the time, members of the carabinieri were forbidden from marrying foreigners. The marriage was, therefore, celebrated clandestinely, and was not registered civilly until August 5, 1946. The union proved much happier and together they had a daughter, Maria da Glória Cristina Amélia Valéria Antónia Blais de Saxe-Coburgo Gotha e Bragança, born in 1946. Maria Cristina married the Spanish sculptor Miguel Ortíz y Berrocal (1933–2006) and together they lived in Verona and had two sons: Carlos Miguel Berrocal de Saxe-Coburgo Gotha e Bragança (born 1976) and Beltrão José Berrocal de Saxe-Coburgo Gotha e Bragança (born 1978).
Blais died in 1983. In 1985, Maria Pia married António João da Costa Amado-Noivo (January 28, 1952 - December 29, 1996). At the time of the wedding, Maria Pia was 78, Amado-Noivo 33.
Read more about this topic: Maria Pia De Saxe-Coburgo E Bragança
Famous quotes containing the words marriages and/or children:
“Good marriages are made in heaven. Or some such place.”
—Robert Bolt (1924–1995)
“The children are all crying in their pens
and the surf carries their cries away.
They are old men who have seen too much,
their mouths are full of dirty clothes,
the tongues poverty, tears like pus.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)