Anna Jagiellonka

Anna Jagiellon
Queen Anna in her coronation robes (1576 painting by Martin Kober)
Queen of Poland Grand Duchess of Lithuania
Reign	15 December 1575 – 18 September 1587
Coronation	1 May 1576 in Kraków
Predecessor	Henry de Valois
Successor	Interrex 1586–1587 Sigismund III Vasa 1587
Born	(1523-10-18)18 October 1523 Kraków, Kingdom of Poland
Died	9 September 1596(1596-09-09) (aged 72) Warsaw, Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
Burial	12 November 1596 Wawel Cathedral
Spouse	Stephen Báthory
Dynasty	Jagiellon
Father	Sigismund I the Old
Mother	Bona Sforza
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Anna Jagiellon (Polish: Anna Jagiellonka, Lithuanian: Ona Jogailaitė; 18 October 1523 – 12 November 1596) was Queen of Poland and Grand Duchess of Lithuania in her own right from 1575 to 1586. She was a daughter of Polish King Sigismund I the Old and his Italian wife Bona Sforza. Despite multiple proposals, she remained unmarried until the age of 52. After the death of King Sigismund II Augustus, her brother and the last male member of the Jagiellon dynasty, Anna's hand was sought by pretenders to the Polish–Lithuanian throne to maintain the dynastic tradition. She was elected, along with her then-fiancé Stephen Báthory, as co-ruler in the 1576 royal election of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Their marriage was a formal arrangement and distant. Báthory was preoccupied with the Livonian War, while Anna spent her time in Warsaw on local administrative matters and several construction works. After Báthory's death in December 1586, she had an opportunity to claim the throne for herself (she was co-ruler and not merely a consort), but did not even attempt it. Instead, she promoted her nephew Sigismund III Vasa, establishing House of Vasa on the Polish–Lithuanian throne for the next eighty years (1587–1668).

Anna Jagiellon was born on 18 October 1523 to the Polish king and queen, Sigismund I the Old and Bona Sforza. She spent most of her childhood in Kraków. Twice, from June 1533 to November 1536 and from April 1540 to June 1542, Anna and two of her sisters were left alone in Kraków while the rest of the family was in Lithuania. That meant that the three sisters grew closer (they separated only in 1556 when Sophia Jagiellon married Henry V, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg), but grew more distant from their elder brother Sigismund II Augustus. Her early life was rather mundane. She embroidered and sewed, played chess and dice, was involved in works of charity and fulfilled her obligations as a princess. She also received an education – she was fluent in Italian and knew Latin – but her teachers are unknown.