Name Princess Pia | ||
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Issue Prince Dimitri of YugoslaviaPrince Michael of YugoslaviaPrince Sergius of YugoslaviaPrincess Helen of Yugoslavia House House of Savoy (by birth)House of Karadordevic (by marriage)House of Bourbon-Parma (by marriage) Mother Princess Marie-Jose of Belgium Children Prince Dimitri of Yugoslavia, Prince Michael of Yugoslavia Parents Marie Jose of Belgium, Umberto II of Italy Grandparents Elisabeth of Bavaria, Queen of Belgium, Albert I of Belgium, Elena of Montenegro, Victor Emmanuel III of Italy Great-grandparents Umberto I of Italy, Margherita of Savoy Similar People Princess Maria Gabriella, Marie Jose of Belgium, Princess Maria Beatrice, Umberto II of Italy, Vittorio Emanuele - Prince of | ||
Princess Maria Pia of Bourbon-Parma (née Princess Maria Pia of Savoy; born 24 September 1934) is the eldest daughter of Umberto II of Italy and Marie-José of Belgium. She is the older sister of Princess Maria Gabriella of Savoy, Vittorio Emanuele, Prince of Naples, and Princess Maria Beatrice of Savoy.
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Biography
Maria Pia Elena Elisabetta Margherita Milena Mafalda Ludovica Tecla Gennara di Savoia was the first-born child of the Prince and Princess of Piedmont, born in Naples, Italy in 1934. Her parents, married since 1930, were unhappy together, as her mother confessed in an interview many years later (On n'a jamais été heureux, "We were never happy"), and separated after the Italian monarchy was abolished by plebiscite on 2 June 1946. Exiled, the family gathered briefly in Portugal, and she and her three younger siblings soon went with their mother to Switzerland while their father remained in Portugal. Being devout Catholics, her parents never divorced.
Marriages and issue
On the royal cruise of the yacht, Agamemnon, hosted by Queen Frederica of Greece on 22 August 1954, she met and later married Prince Alexander of Yugoslavia (1924–2016), son of Prince Paul of Yugoslavia and Princess Olga of Greece and Denmark. Not long after their wedding, Maria Pia gave birth to the couple's set of fraternal twin sons. Another set of twins was born to Maria Pia during the marriage five years later, this time a girl and boy:
The couple were divorced in 1967.
In 2003, Maria Pia was remarried to Prince Michel of Bourbon-Parma (born 1926), son of Prince René of Bourbon-Parma and Princess Margaret of Denmark, whose marriage with Princess Yolande de Broglie-Revel had been annulled and with whom he has five dynastic children, also being the father of a child born out of wedlock in 1977, Amélie de Bourbon de Parme (wed in 2009 to Igor Bogdanoff). Through him she was a sister-in-law of Queen Anne of Romania. Maria Pia's ex-husband, Prince Alexander was also remarried, to Princess Barbara of Liechtenstein, a cousin of that principality's monarch, and they had one son, Prince Dušan Paul.