The Duchess of Alba, an Unconventional Aristocrat, Dies at 88
By RAPHAEL MINDER

MADRID — The Duchess of Alba, a flamboyant Spanish aristocrat known for her lifestyle, her vast wealth, her art collection and her unmatched list of titles, died on Thursday in her palace in Seville. She was 88.

Her death was announced by the mayor of Seville, Juan Ignacio Zoido.

The duchess — her full name was María del Rosario Cayetana Alfonsa Victoria Eugenia Francisca Fitz-James Stuart y de Silva — had more than 40 titles, largely inherited through ancestors’ marriages. She was recognized by Guinness World Records as the noble with the most official titles in the world.

Certain privileges came with her status as head of the five-century-old House of Alba. She did not have to kneel before the pope, for example, and she had the right to ride on horseback into Seville Cathedral.

But more than her titles and her royal relations, it was her romantic life and her outspokenness that fascinated the Spanish news media.

She was born on March 28, 1926, in the family’s Liria Palace in Madrid, where Francisco Goya had painted one of her ancestors. But she spent some of her formative years in London, where her father was posted as ambassador during World War II.

She returned to Spain to marry Pedro Luis Martínez de Irujo y Artàzcoz, the son of the Duke of Sotomayor, in a lavish ceremony in Seville Cathedral that The New York Times called “the most expensive wedding in the world.”

After her husband’s death in 1972, the duchess made a highly unconventional choice by marrying her confessor, a defrocked Jesuit priest, Jesús Aguirre y Ortiz de Zárate, who was 11 years her junior. He died in 2001.

“I’m not a person who allows herself to get managed,” she once said in an interview with the Spanish magazine Hola. “I’ve got my own ideas and try to turn them into reality.”

She also drew attention for her facial cosmetic surgery, and for her penchant for hippie-style hats and bright, flowered dresses.

Her third marriage, in 2011, again made headlines. This time she married Alfonso Díez Carabantes, a civil servant almost 25 years her junior. The ceremony was in the chapel of one of her many lavish and historic residences, the Dueñas Palace in Seville.

News of their romance thrilled the Spanish gossip media but apparently angered her children, who were concerned about the intrusion into the Alba household of a man with little wealth or credentials. One of her six children, Cayetano Martínez de Irujo, called on his mother to bear in mind her “historic responsibility” before deciding to marry again.

The Alba family fortune has been estimated at $4.4 billion, although much of that wealth has not been officially valued.

Still, to end such family opposition to her marriage plans, the duchess presented her children with an inheritance plan that would guarantee each of them at least one of the House of Alba’s properties. In addition, Mr. Díez Carabantes renounced any claim to the family fortune.

Besides their estates, the Alba family owns one of the finest and largest art collections in private Spanish hands, reaching back five centuries to the origins of the family. It also includes Impressionist paintings and other works acquired far more recently by the duchess herself.

In a tribute on Thursday, Mariano Rajoy, Spain’s prime minister, praised her efforts to build an art and history collection that he described as “essential to understand the development of Spain and Europe.”

Much of the collection sits in the Liria Palace in Madrid. It includes historic books and documents, most notably Christopher Columbus’s first map of the Americas. As part of Spain’s national patrimony, the collection could not be divested by the duchess or her heirs without the Culture Ministry’s permission.

The duchess is survived by her husband and six children as well as several grandchildren.

Her oldest son, Carlos Fitz-James Stuart, is to take over at the helm of the family’s foundation, whose assets also include another palace in Salamanca. He inherits dozens of titles.

全世界頭銜最多 西班牙艾爾巴女公爵去世

擁有全球最多頭銜的西班牙艾爾巴女公爵廿日在親人陪伴下離世，享壽八十八歲。

富裕的艾爾巴女公爵日前罹患肺炎，廿日在家人圍繞下於西班牙塞維利亞的杜埃納斯宮離世。這座建於十四世紀的宮殿以種滿檸檬樹的庭院聞名，也是艾爾巴女公爵最鍾愛的房產。

女公爵以鬈髮和鮮豔的衣著品味著稱，她擁有全球最長的頭銜「瑪麗亞．德爾羅薩里奧．卡雅塔娜．阿爾芳薩．維多利亞．尤金尼亞．弗朗西斯卡．菲茨—詹姆士．斯圖爾特．德席爾瓦」，朋友則稱她為「卡雅塔娜」。艾爾巴女公爵曾十四度受封西班牙（最高爵位）大公、五度受封公爵、一度受封伯公爵（countess-duchess）、十八度受封侯爵、十八次受封伯爵，一次受封子爵，獲金氏世界紀錄認證為頭銜最多的人。

艾爾巴女公爵2011年梅開三度，下嫁小她廿五歲的公務員男友迪亞茲，還脫掉鞋子在婚宴上大跳佛朗明哥舞。艾爾巴女公爵的身家介於六億至卅五億歐元間，她在自傳中寫道「我不喜歡討論錢，許多人搞不清楚擁有現金和坐擁資產的差別，我們從來沒有太多現金」。

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/21/world/europe/the-duchess-of-alba-dies-at-88-unconventional-aristocrat.html

2014-11-21．聯合報．A13．國際．編譯陳韻涵