Maria Mercedes

Infanta dona Maria de las Mercedes of Spain (1880–1904), Princess of the Asturias, and for a period 1885-86 when she was five years old, the extant Head of the State of Spain, was born as 'Dona Maria de las Mercedes de Borbon y Asburgo-Lorena', eldest daughter of King Alfonso XII of Spain (Don Alfonso de Borbon de Cadiz y Borbon de Espana) and his second wife Maria Christina of Austria, Archduchess, Queen 'Dona Maria Cristina de Asburgo-Lorena y de Asburgo-Lorena', queen consort of Spain.

Were the child, her mother was pregnant with at the death of Alfonso XII, a daughter, Maria Mercedes would have become Queen Regnant of Spain, Her Catholic Majesty, etc.

When her posthumous only brother Alfonso XIII of Spain was born in 1886, Maria Mercedes lost her latent Queenship, returning to the position of heiress presumptive of Spain, which she held until the birth of Alfonso's first child.

Infanta Maria Mercedes married her kinsman Prince Carlos de Borbon of Sicily, a nephew of the King of the then defunct Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, who was elevated to titles of Infante of Spain and Royal Prince. She died young, her children just babies. Her son Alfonso became 1960 the Pretender of the crown of Two Sicilies and assumed its traditional title of Duke of Calabria.