The cursed inheritance
Their Mother Inherited A Priceless Archive. The Battle To Control It Tore The Family Apart
An imprisoned duchess, a palace showdown, and a death-bed wedding: inside the bitter battle over a priceless historical treasure.
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The Lede
In 2019, Leoncio Alonso González de Gregorio y Álvarez de Toledo, the 22nd Duke of Medina Sidonia, stormed into his late mother's palace on the Andalusian coast of Spain. Celebrated as the "Red Duchess," Luisa Isabel was a socialist-minded, fascism-battling aristocrat beloved by ordinary Spaniards. But now, 11 years after she had cut Leonicio and his siblings out of their inheritance, the Duke had arrived at the palace to lay claim to a national treasure he considered his by birthright.
Key Details
- The treasure, known as the Archive of Medina-Sidonia, was housed in the palace. A collection of 6 million documents, it spans nearly a millennium of Spanish imperial history.
- Luisa Isabel had spent the last two decades of her life cataloging the archive. Perhaps the most important privately held archive in Europe, it is valued at over $60 million.
- What has ensued is a bitter legal battle that has shattered the family, captivated Spanish society, and thrown the fate of the archive into doubt.
