Duchess of Alba dies at age 88
Cayetana held at least 57 titles and was worth up to $5 billion
The Spanish Duchess of Alba, whose profusion of noble titles, wealth and flair made her the subject of fascination in Spain and beyond, particularly after her recent marriage to a commoner 24 years her junior, died Nov. 19 at her Duenas palace in Seville. She was 88.
The cause was pneumonia, a palace spokesman said.
Known as Cayetana — short for Maria del Rosario Cayetana Alfonsa Victoria Eugenia Francisca Fitz-James Stuart y de Silva — the duchess was among the most intriguing and unorthodox members of Europe’s noble class.
Her unruly hair and unusual taste in fashion made her immediately recognizable in the tabloids, which in recent years chronicled her social comings and goings and, in 2011, her nuptials with the civil servant Alfonso Diez Carabantes. On that occasion, she entertained onlookers by lifting her hemline and launching into the flamenco.
Born into the centuries-old aristocratic family known as the House of Alba, she was a duchess, countess and marchioness many times over — so many times over, it was reported, that she possessed more recognized noble and hereditary titles than any other grandee.
“There are so many titles — at least 57 of them, you see — so I only use Alba,” the duchess remarked to The New York Times in 1966, when former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy was preparing to pay her a visit.
Among the duchess’s privileges, available to few if any others, was the right to ride a horse into Seville’s cathedral. By virtue of her rank, she was absolved of the obligation to kneel before the pope. Some technicians of court procedure questioned, hypothetically, whether she would be required to bow before Queen Elizabeth II of England, or vice versa.
The family patrimony included palaces and mansions across Spain. She held a first-edition copy of Miguel de Cervantes’ 17thcentury masterwork “Don Quixote,” relics from explorer Christopher Columbus and an art collection that included paintings by Peter Paul Rubens, Diego Velazquez, Rembrandt and Francisco de Goya.
Pablo Picasso, the modern Spanish master, was said to have invited the duchess to pose for him as a model, but she declined.
Estimates of her wealth ranged from the hundreds of millions to $5 billion. More precise figures were difficult to obtain, in part because much of her fortune existed in the illiquid form of real estate and art.
She was an enthusiast of bullfights and horses. In matters of fashion, she favored clothing described in the English press as “bohemian,” as well as anklets.
By 2011, as she prepared to marry Diez, the duchess was 85 and had been widowed twice. Skeptics, including some of her children, questioned her fiance’s intentions.
The duchess reacted with apparent indignation and remarked, according to the British press, that her children “don’t want me to marry, but they change partners more often than I do.” She noted that she had known Diez for three decades and spoke of the sincerity of their love. “Alfonso doesn’t want anything,” she said. “All he wants is me.”
Diez publicly renounced any claims to her fortune, and the duchess pre-emptively divvied her wealth between her children and grandchildren. “I’m not a person who allows herself to get managed,” she once said. “I’ve got my own ideas and try to turn them into reality.”