"Be humble and charitable. Disregard human riches which by a stroke of adverse fortune can be lost from one moment to another. Love virtue and love study. They are the greatest aids in life. Learn to do good for good's sake, never for vain glory."
Carlo Emanuele dal Pozzo to his daughter Maria Vittoria
Everybody knows where Via Maria Vittoria is, as well as the homonymous hospital or the Palazzo Cisterna in Turin, but few people know that they were dedicated to Maria Vittoria Dal Pozzo, a female character, often forgotten, very important for Turin's history.
Heiress of an ancient Piedmontese family, she was born in 1847 and lived most of her life between Turin, staying in the Cisterna Palace, family property, and the Reano Castle. At least until 1867 when she married the third son of the King of Italy Vittorio Emanuele II, Amedeo Duca d'Aosta with whom she spent some peaceful years and became mother of three children.
Unlike many marriages contracted in those years, theirs was sealed by true love.
In 1870, after the deposition of Queen Isabella II of Spain, Amedeo was called by Cortes to ascend the Spanish Throne.
Maria Vittoria followed her husband and dedicated herself to charity works in Spain as well, arousing sympathy and approval in the Spanish people.
What always distinguished her was her great generosity: she committed herself, in fact, for all her life (alas short, she died at only twenty-nine years old as a result of tuberculosis) in countless works of assistance in favor of the poor and the dispossessed so much to be remembered as "The Queen of Charity".
