Spanish duchess wins her battle for love

By Sinikka Tarvainen Oct 5, 2011, 12:42 GMT

Seville, Spain - She is 85 and he 60. She is a fabulously wealthy aristocrat and he a modest civil servant. She has been in the limelight all her life while until recently, nobody had heard of him.

When Spain's best-known aristocrat, the Duchess of Alba, married Alfonso Diez on Wednesday, Europe saw one of its most unusual blue-blood weddings in recent years.

The intimate ceremony - the third for the twice-widowed Cayetana Fitz-James Stuart and the first for Diez - took place in the duchess' Duenas palace in the southern city of Seville in the presence of about 30 guests.

The duchess' wedding dress was not white, but was designed in a 'ceremonial' style, its designers Victorio and Lucchino revealed.

Cayetana - as she is often called - had to fight numerous obstacles to get her man, whose intentions were initially viewed with suspicion by her children.

But the duchess finally got her way by giving her five sons and one daughter their inheritances in advance, to dissipate their concern that Diez was after her fortune.

By her full name Rosario Cayetana Alfonsa Victoria Eugenia Francisca Fitz-James Stuart y de Silva, the 18th Duchess of Alba heads an aristocratic dynasty the origins of which go back to the 12th century.

She is said to have more noble titles than Britain's Queen Elizabeth, including five titles of duchess, 18 of marquess and 20 of countess.

She is also said to be so wealthy she could cross Spain without leaving her property, which includes not only land, but also about a dozen palaces filled with priceless art works.

Cayetana had six children from her first marriage to aristocrat Luis Martinez de Irujo, who died in 1972.

Six years later, she wed Jesus Aguirre. She had no children with the former Jesuit priest and intellectual, who died in 2001.

Her choice of Aguirre was considered unconventional for an aristocrat at the time. Three decades later, Cayetana showed an equally independent spirit when she started dating Diez, defying her family and public opinion.

A social security official working in Madrid, Diez initially became acquainted with the Alba family through his brother, an antiquities merchant.

When he saw the duchess for the first time 30 years ago, Alfonso was impressed by the woman whom he had admired from far away, the way he admired Hollywood stars, he said, according to media reports.

Media images of a discreet courtship then began to be published in recent years, with Diez pushing the duchess in a wheelchair when there was concern over her health in 2008.

The duchess' children tried everything to prevent the marriage, even getting King Juan Carlos to intervene against it.

Finally, the duchess divided up her inheritance in advance between her children. Her eldest son Carlos, the Duke of Huescar, will get overall control of the family fortune - estimated at up to 3.5 billion euros (4.6 billion dollars) - after Cayetana passes away.

Diez, who has now given up his job and moved into the duchess' Duenas palace, will get a monthly pension and have the title duke consort.

Even before the wedding, the civil servant had begun changing his ways, adopting dandified manners and greeting onlookers when making public appearances with the duchess, the daily El Pais reported.

Cayetana, meanwhile, 'is a bride happy and in love,' Victorio and Lucchino said.

'The marriage allows Cayetana to gain youth and Alfonso to gain status,' columnist Carmen Rigalt wrote.

Whatever the complex forces driving the unusual union, one thing seems certain: both bride and groom are much happier than before.