Death of a Child in Noble Family: Prince Walter Prosper (1839- 1841) and Funeral Ritual of Schwarzenbergs in the Nineteenth Century
Abstrakt
Funeral rituals and ceremonies of The House Schwarzenberg were inherited from generation to generation only with minor changes and modifications since the 17th century until the interwar period and contributed significantly to the identity of the family.
In my presented paper, I focus on the specific case of Prince Walter Prosper (1839-1841), who died in Vienna at the age of two as a consequence of severe injury of the head. The funeral ceremonies and rituals of this child are used to explain the general course of Schwarzenberg funerals. The whole process begun with post-mortem and was followed with a half-public display of the dead's body, during which the wider family and the closest friends could come and pay they tribute. Then the body was transferred from the place of death to the Třeboň town, place where Schwarzenbergs were traditionally buried. A usual funeral of the House Schwarzenberg member would end at this moment, but not the one of Prince Walter.
His body was carried from Třeboň to Český Krumlov, considered as the main residence of the family in Bohemia, where it was temporarily buried into castle chapel of St. Anne. After a few months, the coffin with his remains was taken to the newly erected tomb, Waltersruhe, which was built particularly for the Prince near to Český Krumlov Castle estate. Nevertheless, even there Prince Walter did not find his eternal peace. When his mother died, in 1873, his body was buried alongside her in the St. Giles Church in Třeboň and after few years it was transferred to new, spectacular, gothic revival tomb outside Třeboň. The case of Prince Walter is also used to describe the impact of a child's death on the family members and their behaviour.
The paper is based on archives study in State Regional Archive Český Krumlov, which contains The Archive of The House Schwarzenberg