Swedish monarch Queen Kristina of Sweden was BOTD in 1626. Born in Stockholm, the eldest surviving child of King Gustav Adolf, she inherited the throne when she was six. Highly educated, she attended council meetings in her teens, becoming Queen in her own right when she turned 18. She was instrumental in concluding the Peace of Westphalia, ending the Thirty Years’ War. One of the most learned women of her age, her interests included religion, philosophy, mathematics, music, theatre and natural sciences, and had a long correspondence with philosopher René Descartes. A great patron of the arts, she amassed an incredible collection of paintings, sculptures, rare books and manuscripts. Her lavish spending brought the country to the verge of bankruptcy, and her refusal to marry (and secret conversion to Catholicism) led her to abdicate the throne in 1654 in favour of her cousin. She relocated to Rome, where she became a local celebrity, popularising theatre and opera and supporting the careers of sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini and composers Arcangelo Corelli and Domenico Scarlatti. An advocate of religious tolerance, she issued a declaration in 1686 that all Roman Jews were under her protection. Kristina never married or had children, and was infamous for wearing men’s clothing, preferring masculine pursuits like fencing, horse riding and bear hunting. Her gender identity and sexuality were the subject of gossip and speculation through her life. In her memoir, she wrote that she was “neither Male nor Hermaphrodite, as some People in the World have pass’d me for”. Nonetheless, she has fascinated biographers and historians, who have argued variously that she was heterosexual, lesbian, asexual, intersex or transgender. Her lovers were thought to include Ebba Sparre, Gabrielle de Rochechouart de Mortemart, Angelina Giorgino and Cardinal Decio Azzolino. Kristina died in 1689 aged 62, and became the first woman buried in St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. She has been portrayed many times in literature, film and theatre, most famously by Greta Garbo in the 1933 film Queen Christina.