Maria Pawlowna von Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach (1786–1859)

Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna was born in Saint Petersburg, Russia, a daughter of Tsar Paul I and his wife Sophie Dorothee of Württemberg. Catherine the Great was her paternal grandmother. In 1804, she was married to Prince Carl Friedrich of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, with whom she would have four children.

Through this marriage, the small, relatively insignificant and impoverished duchy of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach allied itself with Russia and its Imperial dynasty, one of the wealthiest and most powerful at the time, against the Emperor Napoleon's ambitions of conquest. However, when the war came to Weimar, Maria Pavlovna and her family were forced to flee. After Napoleon's final defeat, she returned and took part in the Congress of Vienna with her father-in-law, Duke Carl August. As the sister of the victorious Tsar Alexander I, she wielded considerable influence: Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach gained territory with around 80,000 people and was elevated to a grand duchy.
She became a patron of the arts and sciences and a friend of Goethe.

In 1841, she engaged Franz Liszt as court conductor, and his presence attracted other important musicians to Weimar, including Wagner, Berlioz, and Anton Rubinstein. Her diaries were published after her death.

Do not confuse her with the 20th-century Grand Duchess Marie Pavlovna (1890-1958), who became a successful French fashion entrepreneur, and whose works are currently showing on another page.