Wednesday, September 1, 2021

Princess Cecilia of Bourbon Parma (1935-2021)

@HRH Prince Sixto Enrique  with his father, Xavier and Princess Cecilia


 HRH Prince Sixto Enrique of Bourbon-Parma has announced the death today of his sister, Princess Cecilia.   The princess died at the Broca Hospital in Paris.  She was 86 years old.

 She was born HRH Princesss Cécile Marie Antoinette Madeleine Jeanne Agnès Françoise in Paris on April 12, 1935, the fourth of six children of HRH Prince Francesco Saverio (Xavier) Carlo Maria Anna Giuseppe, Duke of Parma and Piacenza (1889-1977) and  Madeleine de Bourbon-Busset (1898-1984).

The princess made her debut at the Bourbon-Parma Ball on April 23, 1955, which was held at the Ritz Hotel.

Embed from Getty Images 


 In the late 1960s, the princess, a delegate of the Order of Malta,  spent 15 months working in hospitals in Biafra.  She spoke to the French newspaper, Le Figaro on Jan 12, 1970, after she was one of the last aid workers to leave Biafra.  Cecilia said she had witnesses "soldiers going to the front "completely exhausted.  They had at the end of the day only a spoonful of manioc/"

Manioc, a starchy root, is a staple in some tropical areas. 

By the end of the conflict in Biafra, the princess said: "that the number of refugees had increased greatly."   She added: “They had nothing to eat and were dying of thirst. But the refugees insisted that they did not want to fall into the hands of the Nigerian troops because they were afraid of massacres."

She was also an ardent supporter of Carlism.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGWBNOQ8qfI

Cecilia never married.  She is survived by two sisters, HRH Princess Francois Lobkowicz and  HRH Princess Marie des Neiges and her younger brother, HRH Prince Sixto Enrique and 6 nieces and nephews,  Prince Charles Lobkowicz, Princess Marie Gabrielle Lobkowicz, a nun with the Little Sisters of the Poor in the United States, HRH Carlos Xavier, Duke of Parma and Piacenza,  HRH Prince Jaime of Bourbon-Parma, Count of Bardi, HRH Princess Margarita of Bourbon-Parma, Countess of Colonna, and HRH Princess Maria Carolina of Bourbon-Parma, Marchesa di Sala, and numerous great-nieces and great-nephews.  She was one of the godmothers of the Duke of Parma's younger daughter, Princess Cecilia


  Embed from Getty Images

On August 27, the funeral of Cecilia's sister, Princess Maria Teresa, took place in Parma.  Maria Teresa died from Covid on March 26, 2020. 

https://royalmusingsblogspotcom.blogspot.com/2020/03/princess-maria-teresa-of-bourbon-parma.html

https://gpdhome.typepad.com/nieuwsberichten/2021/08/uitvaart-prinses-maria-teresa-in-parma.html

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