ACCESSION OF FRANCIS III, DUKE OF LORRAINE

ST URBAIN, Ferdinand de: Lorraine, 1729, Bronze, 62 mm
Obv: Bust of Francis III    FRANCISCVS. III. D.G. DVX. LOT. BAR. REX. IER.
Rev: Phoenix on mountainside about to ascend toward heaven    ALTER ET IDEM.
Exergue:  VIXIT. LEOPOLDVS. FRANCISCVS REGNAT XXVII. MARTII. MDCCXXIX.
Signed:  S.V.
Ref: Forrer p. 309 # 1, p. 312 (ill.)

Francis III, Duke of Lorraine and Bar, was the son and heir of Leopold I, Duke of Lorraine and Bar. To solidify relations with Austria, Francis married Maria Theresa of Austria, daughter and heiress of the emperor Charles VI. Because of this marriage France could not admit the union of Lorraine with the French empire. The War of the Polish Succession offered an opportunity of settling the problem; negotiations led to the treaty of Vienna whereby Francis, in exchange for Tuscany, ceded his rights of Lorraine and Barrois to Stanislaus Leszczynski, the dethroned king of Poland, after whose death they were to pass to his daughter, Louis XV's queen, and so to France.
Francis ascended to the duchy on the death of his father in 1729, the event which this medal commemorates.

LINK to History of Lorraine (from Proceedings of the Friesian School. Edited by Kelley L. Ross, Ph.D.)

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