Baroness Maria Stella Petronilla Ungern-Sternberg

Born in 1773, Maria Stella Petronilla later became known as Lady Newborough and Baroness Ungern-Sternberg. She is remembered chiefly for her memoirs, which recount a life shaped by aristocratic society, family upheaval, and her famous insistence that she had been switched at birth with the child of a ruling house.

That claim brought her lasting attention. In her writing, she presented herself not just as a woman of rank, but as someone trying to make sense of identity, inheritance, and reputation in a world where birth could determine everything. Whatever readers make of her case, it gave her memoirs a sense of urgency that still stands out.

Today, she is of interest both as a memoirist and as a historical curiosity. Her story offers a window into European high society in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, especially the way private lives could become public drama.