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Zita[zE´tu, Ger. tsE´tA] Pronunciation Key, 1892–1989, last empress of Austria and queen of Hungary. The daughter of Duke Robert of Parma, she was married (1911) to Archduke Charles Francis, who in 1916 became emperor as Charles I. She exercised great influence over her husband and was blamed for Charles's letters to her brother, Sixtus of Bourbon-Parma, during World War I that corroborated French claims to Alsace-Lorraine. She was also blamed for Charles's attempts to regain his throne after the war. After her husband's death (1922), Zita brought up her large family in Belgium. She never renounced her ambition to see Archduke Otto, her son (see Hapsburg, Otto von), crowned king of Hungary and possibly emperor of Austria. From 1940 to 1949 Zita lived in the United States and in Canada; she later lived in Switzerland.
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