Mechtild Lichnowsky

Born on March 8, 1879, at Schloss Schönburg near Pocking, she was born Countess Mechtilde Christiane Marie von und zu Arco-Zinneberg and later became known as Princess Mechtilde Lichnowsky. She wrote in several forms, including fiction, essays, and travel writing, and is remembered as a distinctive German literary voice of the early twentieth century.

After her 1904 marriage to Karl Max, Prince Lichnowsky, she lived in places including Silesia, Berlin, and London, where her husband served as Imperial German ambassador before the First World War. Sources on her life also note her ties to important artistic and intellectual circles, including her support for the avant-garde and her reputation as an early collector of Picasso.

She continued her literary life across years of political upheaval and later married Ralph Harding Peto in 1937. She died in London on June 4, 1958.