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Doña María de las Mercedes de Zornoza y Ponce de León
(1942 – 2020)
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| Doña María de las Mercedes de Zornoza y Ponce de León marries Prince George Bagration-Mukhransky Photograph (c) Corbis Images |
On 17 March 2020, doña María de las Mercedes de Zornoza y Ponce de León passed away at Madrid. She was seventy-seven years-old. María was born at Madrid on 2 August 1942 as the daughter of don José de Zornoza and doña María de los Dolores Ponce de León y Puicercus (d.Madrid 28 February 2008).
In March 1968, Maria de las Mercedes de Zornoza y Ponce de León married Prince George (Jorge) Bagration-Mukhransky (1944 – 2008). George was the son of Prince Irakly Bagration-Mukhransky (1909 – 1977) and Nobile Maria Antonietta Pasquini dei Conti di Costafiorita (1911 – 1944). George’s aunt Leonida married Grand Duke Vladimir Kirillovich of Russia; George’s first cousin is Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna of Russia, Head of the Imperial House of Romanov. George and María had three children: Princess Maria Antonieta (b.1969), Prince Irakly (b.1972), and Prince David (b.1976). The couple eventually divorced, and María never remarried. María remained a close friend of her former sister-in-law, Princess Mariam Bagration-Mukhransky, who never really forgave her brother for divorcing his first wife.
María is survived by her three children and two grandsons: Jaime Gaixas y Bagration and Prince Giorgi Bagration-Bagration (b.2011), who is the son of Prince David and Princess Anna Bagration-Gruzinsky (b.1976). The marriage of María’s son David and the heiress of the Bagration-Gruzinsky branch of the Georgian royal families led to a brief rapprochement between the two leading lines of the Bagrationi royal house.
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