Archduke Franz Karl of Austria

Franz Karl Joseph was born into the House of Habsburg-Lorraine on 17 December 1802 and lived through most of the nineteenth century without wearing a crown himself. His legacy came through his sons: Franz Joseph I, who ruled Austria for sixty-eight years, and Maximilian, who took and lost the throne of Mexico. Through his third son Karl Ludwig, the line continued to Franz Ferdinand, assassinated in Sarajevo in 1914, the spark that set Europe ablaze. Franz Karl died on 8 March 1878, seventeen years an emperor's father and unaware his descendants would bookend the empire's final chapter — one as…