Anna Aloysia Maximiliane von Lamberg

Who was Anna Aloysia Maximiliane von Lamberg?

Anna Aloysia Maximiliane Louise von Lamberg was an Austrian countess who was successively the mistress of Augustus II the Strong, King of Poland, and Aleksander Benedykt Sobieski. She is known to history as Countess Esterle.

Maximiliane was the daughter of an Austrian count, Kaspar Friedrich von Lamberg-Kunstadt, and his first wife, Marie Františka Terezie Hýzrlová z Chodů, a Czech noblewoman. In 1695 she married graf Franz Michael Hiserle von Chodau. She became the mistress of Augustus II the Strong in either 1696, with the affair lasting until 1699, or 1704. Her first husband divorced her in 1697, and in 1698 she married graf Gustav Hanibal von Oppersdorff. On 1 November 1698, she gave birth to a son, graf von Oppersdorf, whose father was supposedly Augustus II. The child died soon after birth. Her relationship with Augustus II ended when the "playboy king" discovered that Maximiliane had been having affairs with several gentlemen at court; she was given 24 hours to leave the country.

Later, in Wrocław, she became the mistress of Aleksander Benedykt Sobieski, who had been Augustus's rival in the 1697 election for the Polish throne.