Marble statue of Maria Beatrice d'Este with a staff and a scroll, and an eagle at her foot, on a tall pedestal made by Lorenzo Bartolini enriched by bas-reliefs by three different sculptors. At the base of the pedestal there is a platform with steps ending against a sphinx (usually called 'il leone', the lion; a copy of a piece in the Egyptian
collections in the Louvre) under which two streams of water pouring into a marble basin.
Biography
Maria Beatrice d’Este (1750 – 1829) was heiress of Modena and Reggio as well as the sovereign of Massa and Carrara from 1790 until 1796 and from 1815 until her death in 1829.
Maria Beatrice was born in Modena, the eldest child of two monarchs, Ercole III d'Este, Duke of Modena and Maria Teresa Cybo-Malaspina, reigning duchess of Massa and princess of Carrara.
Her parents' marriage was unhappy and they lived separated from each other; they only produced two children: Maria Beatrice, born on 7 April 1750 and Rinaldo Francesco, born on 4 January 1753. The death of Rinaldo aged four months old (5 May 1753) led to Maria being acknowledged as an heiress. Her paternal ancestors included Louis XIII of France, the French regent Philippe d'Orléans, and Mary, Queen of Scots. Her maternal ancestors were members of the House of Cybo-Malaspina.
As heiress to four states (Modena, Reggio, Massa and Carrara), she was a very attractive wedding partner. Empress Maria Theresa sought to arrange a marriage between Maria Beatrice and Archduke Leopold (future Holy Roman Emperor) but this never materialised. Instead she married Leopold's brother, Archduke Ferdinand of Austria, in a union through which the Austrians aimed to expand their influence in Italy.
The couple was engaged from 1754. As the children were so young, the marriage was not celebrated till 1771 when a ceremony in Milan on 15 October officially united them. Festivities arranged for this occasion included the operas Ascanio in Alba by Mozart and Il Ruggiero by Johann Adolph Hasse.
The couple moved between Modena and Milan, where they lived in the Royal palace. As the Duchy of Modena did not allow female succession, Maria Beatrice's rights to the throne of Modena and Reggio passed to her son when her father died. When her mother died in 1790, however, she succeeded her as Duchess of Massa and Carrara. After the French conquest of Northern Italy, she spent her life mostly in Austria and left the rule to administrators. By her marriage, the House of Austria-Este was created, a cadet branch of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine, which ruled Modena between 1814 and 1859. After Maria Beatrice d'Este's death at Vienna in 1829, Massa and Carrara were added to the Duchy of Modena.
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