Leopold II, Grand Duke of Tuscany

LEOPOLD II, Grand Duke of Tuscany. - B. 3 Oct. 1797 in Florence, d. 29 Jan. 1870 in Rome. Son of Ferdinand III and of Maria Luisa Amalia of Naples, he left Florence with his family after the French invasion in 1799 and followed his father in his wanderings abroad, to Salzburg and to Würzburg. Having returned to his homeland after the fall of Napoleon, on the death of Ferdinand III, in 1824, he became grand duke. Well prepared for public administration, L. proved himself a sovereign of no common gifts.

Deeply concerned for the good of his subjects, and for the economic well-being of the country, he granted hospitality to those who, persecuted elsewhere, sought refuge in Tuscany. L. permitted the first congress of Italian scientists to be held in Pisa in 1839, a gathering that was political as well as academic in character, in favor of the national idea. In 1848 L. granted a statute and consented to Tuscan participation in the first war of independence but, not wishing to sanction the law on the Italian Constituent Assembly, he withdrew to Gaeta, where Pius IX was already staying. On his return he continued the negotiations with the Holy See for the conclusion of a definitive concordat (some preliminary articles had already been agreed on 30 March 1848), signed on 25 Apr. 1851 in Rome. The bonds of the jurisdictional legislation of Leopold I were in part loosened, to the advantage of good relations between State and Church. In 1859 L., having lost the grand duchy, settled in Austria. Having gone to Rome in Nov. 1869 to escape the rigors of the northern climate, he died there a few weeks later.