Margarida of Savoy, Vicereine of Portugal

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Margaret of Savoy, Duchess Consort of Mantua and Montferrat (Torino 28 April 1589 - Miranda 26 June 1655) (Italian: Margherita, Spanish: Margarita, Portuguese: Margarida, French: Marguerite) was best known as the last Spanish Vicereine of Portugal. In Portuguese she is known as Duquesa de Mântua.

She was born, during the powerful imperial reign of her maternal grandfather Philip II of Spain, as one of the several children of Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy (1562-1630) and infanta Caterina Micaela of Spain (1567-97).

She was married to the future Francis IV, Duke of Mantua (1586-1612) and Montferrat on 19 February 1608, the wedding celebrated in Turin.

In 1612 her husband succeeded his father Vincent I, Duke of Mantua. Soon she widowed. Their marriage had produced a few children, but only one daughter, Maria, Duchess of Montferrat (1609-60), survived childhood.

As the couple had no surviving male issue, in 1612 duke Francis' next brother succeeded in the duchy of Mantova. Whereas the Montferrat was a contested inheritance, it having been historically, when a margraviate, inherited also by females - indeed, it had been brought to the Mantuan princely dynasty (the Gonzaga) by the marriage of Margherita Paleologa, Margravine of Montferrat, in 1531. Accordingly, the baby Maria's claims were asserted and dowager duchess Margaret required to be made her regent in Montferrat.

The point remained almost moot - Maria was a minor for the next decade - and ultimately, duke Francis' brothers failed to produce any legitimate issue, and the entire inheritance became subject to Mantuan War of Succession (1627-32).

Duchess Margaret's daughter Maria was in 1627 married to Charles, Duke of Rethel (1609-31), the eldest son of the distant Gonzaga heir-male (Charles I, Duke of Mantua, 1580-1637), in order to join two of the Mantuan claims. They had to war, but in the end their line prevailed and got universal recognition as Dukes of Mantua and Montferrat.

Upon the 1633 death of her maternal aunt, Archduchess Isabella Clara Eugenia, duchess dowager of Luxembourg etc. and Vicereine of Low Countries, her brother Victor Amadeus became heir to the rights of their grandmother Elisabeth of Valois, eldest daughter and in her issue the heiress of Henry II of France and Catherine of Medici.

She had ancestral links to Portugal: two of her great-grandmothers (i.e: Empress Isabella and Duchess Beatrice of Savoy) had been daughters of king Manuel I of Portugal. In 1635, Dowager Duchess Margherita was made the vicereine of Portugal by her cousin Philip IV of Spain.

After the demise of the Count of Basto, she was named vicereine of Portugal, at the time in a personal Iberian union with Spain, where she moved to in 1634. This nomination was the result of the efforts of Diogo Soares, member of the Council of Portugal at Madrid, a friend of the Count-Duke of Olivares and a relative of Miguel de Vasconcelos who, in 1635, would be named secretary of state of Portugal.

As a result of the Portuguese independentist revolution (called Restoration of Independence) of 1640, Vasconcelos was assassinated and the Duchess of Mantua, who tried to calm the Portuguese people during demonstrations in the Portuguese Terreiro do Paço (at the time Lisbon's main square), was eventually deported to Spain. The Portuguese rebelled within five years, and proclaimed the duke of Braganza as the new king. Margarita was surrounded in her headquarters in Lisbon, but her support collapsing, the new potentate allowed her to depart.

She died in 1655, her daughter Duchess Maria of Rethel and Montferrat surviving her, with two grandchildren, of whom the daughter Eleanor had in 1651 become the Holy Roman Empress and the son in 1637 the reigning duke of Mantua. At her death, both her grandchildren had already produced great-grandchildren for her.