An Imperial engagement

 HI & RH Archduke Joseph Albrecht Alexander Karl Franz Maria Joachim Anna of Austria and Countess Sophie Maria Isabelle Alberta Johanna Henriette von Schaesberg are engaged to be married.

Archduke Joseph, who was born in Hannover on July 26, 1994. is the second of four children, but the eldest son of HI & RH Archduke Joseph Karl Maria Arpád Stephan Pius Ignatius Aloysius Cyrillus of Austria and HSH  Princess Margarete Elisabeth Juliana Maria of Hohenberg.

The groom's mother is the eldest of four children of the late HSH Prince Albrecht Philipp Leopold Josef Andreas Hubertus Maria of Hohenberg and Countess Leontine von Cassis-Faraone.   Prince Albrecht was the third son of the late HH Duke Maximilian Karl Franz Michael Hubert Anton Ignatius Joseph Maria of Hohenberg, the eldest son of the late HI & RH Archduke Franz Ferdinand Karl Ludwig Joseph of Austria and Countess Sophie Chotek von Chotkowa, who was created Duchess of Hohenberg by Emperor Franz Joseph in 1905.  Franz Ferdinand was heir presumptive to the thrones of Austria and Hungary.  His marriage was morganatic and his wife and children did not share his imperial rank and did not have succession rights to the throne.  He and his wife were killed at Sarajevo on June 28, 1914, by a Bosnian Serb Gavrilo Prinzip.  

Princess Margarete married Archduke Joseph in Vienna in January 1991.  Archduke Joseph is the third of eight children and the eldest surviving son of HI & RH Archduke Joseph Arpád Benedikt Ferdinand Franz Maria Gabriel and HSH Princess Maria Princess zu Löwenstein-Wertheim-Rosenberg 

Franz Ferdinand's assassination was one of the catalysts that led to the First World War.

The bride-to-be is the elder of two daughters of Johannes Friedrich Walter Alfred Josef Maria Count von Schaesberg and his first wife Baroness Antoinette von Hoenning O'Carroll.  She was born in Regensburg on December 12, 1997.

Antoinette's maternal first cousins include the late Alexandra Miloradovich, who married Rudolph, Duke of Croy, and Johanna Raitz von Frentz, the wife of Prince Heinrich XIV Reuss.   She grew up at Schloss Sunching, in Bavaria, the family home that belonged to Antoinette's grandmother, Countess Gabriele von Seinsheim, who married Baron Johann Ludwig von Hoenning O'Carroll.  Their son, Zdenko, married Princess Margarete Lobkowicz.   She died in 1948.  Two years later, Zdenko married Princess Adelgunde of Bavaria.

The Sünching estate was left to Sophie's father after the death of his mother.

Countess Sophie's paternal grandparents were Heinrich Wilhelm Viktor Walter Hubertus Maria Count von Schaesberg and Princess Margarethe von Croy, who was a first cousin to the late Duke Carl of Croy, the father of the present duke, who married Alexandra Miloradovich.