Protest of the Duchess of Savoy against the "Act of Settlement", 1701

In April 1701 the de facto Parliament was debating a bill for an alteration in the succession to the throne by the incapacitating of all those who held communion with the Church of Rome; this bill, which became the Act of Settlement, made the Dowager Electress of Hanover (then 45th in line to the throne) heir after the Prince of Orange and the Princess Anne of Denmark.

At the request of her uncle King James II and VII, the Duchess of Savoy, who at the time was fifth in line to the throne (after the Prince of Wales, the Princess Louise, the Princess Anne of Denmark, and the Prince of Orange), had the Ambassador of Savoy to the Court of St. James lodge a formal protest. The Duchess of Savoy was great-grandmother to King Charles Emmanuel IV of Sardinia, who, on account of his descent from the Duchess of Savoy, succeeded in 1807 to all the British rights of the Cardinal called Duke of York.

A printed version of the Latin text can be found on pages 75 - 76 of The Legitimist Kalendar for the Year of Our Lord 1895, edited by the Marquis de Ruvigny and Raineval (London: Henry & Co., 1895).

Anna Aurelianensis, Dux Sabaudiae, etc., et per matrem Henricam Regalem Magnae Britanniae Principem, ipsa quoque Regio Angliae sanguine prognata, tanto eiusmodi decus habet in pretio, ut differe nequeat ulterius id palam testari inclitae Anglorum genti, ex quo ad culmen huius solii iura ducere magnopere gloriatur. Quam ob rem non nescio statutum in praesentibus Parliamenti commitiis ordinem successionis definire, Regi eidemque Parliamento exponit se post Regem Gulielmum Tertium et Principem Annam a Dana, primum sibi in successione gradum vindicare secundum leges et consuetudinem Angliae, quae semper proximiorem lineam remotiori anteposuerunt. Cum hisce paucis de suo iure indubitato plenissime liqueat, ulterioribus probationibus non eget, unumque superest ut adversus qualemcumque deliberationem aut decisionem contraram protestatur, prout hic omni meliori modo, et efficaciori forma protestatur, consuetudini potius quam necessitati serviens, quid tam alte de tanti Regis tantique Senatus sapientia sentit, ut nihil quidquam ab iis vereatur quod sibi et liberis nocere possit.

Subsignatus ipse Comes Maffei Suae Regiae Celsitudinis a Sabaudia penes Suam Maiestatum Brittanicam Ablegatus extraordinarius, de mandato speciali ac nomine Suae Regiae Celsitudinis Ducissae Sabaudiae suprascriptam protestationem Amplissimo Angliae Senatui offero.

Londoni die vigesim sexta Martii Stilo veteri, novo autem sexta Aprilis 1701.

D. Annibal Comes Maffei