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Speaker 1: Hey, history fans, if you want a double dose of history,

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Speaker 1: here's a rerun for today, brought to you by Tracy V. Wilson.

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Speaker 1: Welcome to this Day in History Class from how Stuff

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Speaker 1: Works dot com and from the desk of Stuff you

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Speaker 1: missed in History Class. It's the show where we explore

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Speaker 1: the past one day at a time with a quick

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Speaker 1: look at what happened today in history. Hello, and welcome

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Speaker 1: to the podcast. I'm Tracy V. Wilson, and it's December eight.

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Speaker 1: Christina of Sweden was born on the Stay in sixteen

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Speaker 1: six and the old style Julian calendar and in the

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Speaker 1: new style Gregorian calendar that was December eight. Her parents

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Speaker 1: were King Gustav the Second Adolf and Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg.

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Speaker 1: They were the King and Queen of Sweden, and her

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Speaker 1: father had grown very concerned about whether he would have

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Speaker 1: an air before Christina was born. Her parents had been

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Speaker 1: through two stillbirths and the death of an infant daughter.

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Speaker 1: There were other people close to the line of succession

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Speaker 1: who had plenty of airs, so this was caused for concern.

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Speaker 1: When Christina was born slightly premature and in a call

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Speaker 1: the midwives announced that the King had a son, and

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Speaker 1: it wasn't until the following day, after a lot of

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Speaker 1: celebration of the birth of a long awaited air, that

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Speaker 1: the midwives finally admitted that they had made a mistake

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Speaker 1: and that they should have said Christina was a girl.

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Speaker 1: This has led to some speculation about whether Christina was intersex,

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Speaker 1: or whether her body was just ambiguous, or whether it

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Speaker 1: was a matter of poor lighting and the midwives seeing

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Speaker 1: what they really wanted to see. Everyone really really wanted

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Speaker 1: a son regardless. Though the king decided to raise Christina

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Speaker 1: as a prince, he warmed up to the idea of

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Speaker 1: having a daughter, but he raised her in many ways

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Speaker 1: as a son as she grew up. This suited her

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Speaker 1: just fine. She was not very fine of the things

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Speaker 1: that women were expected to do during the day, and

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Speaker 1: her father wanted her to learn to ride and fight

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Speaker 1: and handle a bow, and she did all of that.

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Speaker 1: Not only that she did it really well, she really

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Speaker 1: enjoyed it. Her demeanor was just not at all what

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Speaker 1: people thought of as feminine. So it wasn't all that

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Speaker 1: uncommon for royal girls to have the same education as

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Speaker 1: their brothers and their male cousins, but it was pretty

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Speaker 1: uncommon for them to have been as excited about fighting

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Speaker 1: and hunting and whatnot as Christina was. When Christina was five, though,

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Speaker 1: her father died and her mother, whose behavior and emotional

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Speaker 1: state had become increasingly erratic, took her away from her

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Speaker 1: home and the cousins that she'd been living with, where

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Speaker 1: she had been pretty happy until that point. Even though

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Speaker 1: she was the only daughter of the late king, Christina's

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Speaker 1: ascension to the throne had to be approved by Parliament,

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Speaker 1: which was known as the Reeks Dug. They ultimately did approve,

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Speaker 1: and by the to fourteen she was attending council meetings.

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Speaker 1: She became queen at eighteen, although her formal coronation wasn't

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Speaker 1: until she was twenty three. By the time of her coronation,

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Speaker 1: though she was already thinking about abdicating. She had pulled

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Speaker 1: some strings to get a cousin named as her successor,

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Speaker 1: insisting that she had no desire to marry. It was

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Speaker 1: the same cousin that everyone wanted her to marry, and

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Speaker 1: she did finally abdicate and moved to Rome and converted

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Speaker 1: to Catholicism. She seems to have had some second thoughts

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Speaker 1: about this abdication later on, though she tried and failed

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Speaker 1: to take over the throne of Poland Lithuania. She hoped

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Speaker 1: to become the queen of Sweden again after that successor

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Speaker 1: she'd had names suddenly died at a young age, but

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Speaker 1: none of that worked out. Christina wasn't ever known as

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Speaker 1: a particularly good ruler. I mean, she did decide to

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Speaker 1: abdicate before she was even crowned. But she was an

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Speaker 1: extremely learned woman. She spoke multiple languages, including of course

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Speaker 1: Swedish plus Greek, Latin, German, French, Flemish, Italian, Spanish, and

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Speaker 1: Finish with also a little Hebrew in Arabic. She helped

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Speaker 1: start the first Swedish newspaper in sixty five, as well

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Speaker 1: as Sweden's first public opera house and its first universal

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Speaker 1: public school program. She collected a huge amount of art

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Speaker 1: and literature. Her collection of books and manuscripts later on

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Speaker 1: became part of the Vatican Library. So even though she

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Speaker 1: was maybe not the greatest as a queen or a king,

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Speaker 1: depended on how you wanted to look at it, she

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Speaker 1: did other stuff pretty well. And she died in nine

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Speaker 1: at the age of sixty two. You can learn more

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Speaker 1: about her in the October episode of Stuff you miss

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Speaker 1: in History class. Thanks to Casey Pigram and Chandler Maze

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Speaker 1: for their audio work on the show. You can subscribe

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Speaker 1: to This Day in History Class on Apple Podcasts, Google podcast,

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Speaker 1: the I Heart Radio app, and wherever else you get

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Speaker 1: a podcast. Tune in tomorrow for the establishment of a

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Speaker 1: state h