Franz Ferdinand (1863-1914) was the archduke of Austria and heir to the throne of the Habsburg empire of Austria-Hungary. His assassination in 1914 led to the outbreak of World War I (1914-1918).
Franz Ferdinand Karl Ludwig Joseph Maria was born on Dec. 18, 1863, in Graz, Austria. Part of the Habsburg royal family, he was the oldest son of Archduke Karl Ludwig, a younger brother of Emperor Franz Joseph. On June 28, 1914, Franz Ferdinand was in Sarajevo, the capital of Austria-Hungary’s province of Bosnia-Herzegovina. After a bomb attack failed earlier in the day, Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian Serb nationalist, fired two pistol shots into Franz Ferdinand’s car. The shots killed the archduke and his wife, Sophie. On July 28, Austria declared war on Serbia, triggering World War I.
See also Austria-Hungary ; Franz Joseph ; World War I .
