Early Years
Milan Obrenović IV was born in exile in Mărăşeşti, Principality of Moldavia during the period of Karađorđević rule in the Principality of Serbia, which began in 1842 with the deposition of Milan's cousin Prince Mihailo Obrenović.
Milan was the son of Miloš Obrenović (1829–1861) and Elena Maria Catargiu from Moldavia (known in Serbia as Marija Obrenović). Milan's paternal grandfather (Miloš's father) was Jevrem Obrenović (1790–1881), the brother of famous Serb Prince - Miloš Obrenović. Milan was therefore Prince Miloš's grandnephew. Milan had only one sibling - sister Tomanija.
Shortly after Milan's birth, his parents divorced. Couple of years later, at the tender age of seven, Milan lost his father Miloš who died fighting the Turks near Bucharest as a foreign mercenary in the Romanian Army, meaning that mother Marija got a legal custody. Marija, however, lived a lavish aristocratic lifestyle, soon becoming Romanian ruler Alexandru Ioan Cuza's mistress and bearing him two children. As a result she showed little interest in her kids from the previous marriage with Miloš so an agreement was reached for young Milan to get legally adopted by his cousin Prince Mihailo who in the meantime, following the 1858 expulsion of the Karađorđevićs, returned to Serbia where he became the ruling prince in 1860. Milan was brought to Kragujevac by Prince Mihailo who also arranged for a governess to raise the youngster.
Prince Mihailo also took care of his nephew's education, sending him to Lycée Louis-le-Grand in Paris where the young man reportedly displayed considerable maturity.
Read more about this topic: Milan I Of Serbia
Famous quotes related to early years:
“Parents ... are sometimes a bit of a disappointment to their children. They don’t fulfil the promise of their early years.”
—Anthony Powell (b. 1905)