Prince Antoni Henryk Radziwià Âà  (; 13 June 1775 – 7 April 1833) was a PolishâÂÂLithuanian and Prussian noble, aristocrat, musician, and politician. Initially a hereditary Duke of Nieà Âwieà ¼ and Oà Âyka, as a scion of the Radziwià Âà  family he also held the honorific title of a Reichsfürst of the Holy Roman Empire. Between 1815 and 1831 he acted as Duke-Governor (, ) of the Grand Duchy of Posen, an autonomous province of the Kingdom of Prussia created out of Greater Polish lands annexed in the Partitions of Poland.
Antoni Radziwià Âà  was born on 13 June 1775 in Vilnius to Michaà  Hieronim Radziwià Âà  and Helena née Przeà ºdziecka. He studied at the University of Göttingen, like his other brothers: the elder Ludwik Mikoà Âaj and the younger Michaà  Gedeon and Andrzej Walenty. One of his sisters was Aniela Radziwià Âà  (who married Prince Konstanty Adam Czartoryski).
His father was the second son of Prince Marcin Mikoà Âaj Radziwià Âà  and, his second wife, Marta Trembicka. His maternal grandparents were Antoni Przeà ºdziecki and Katarzyna Ogià Âska. After his maternal grandmother's death, his mother was raised by her aunt, Aleksandra Czartoryska, the wife of Michaà  Kazimierz Ogià Âski.
The high standing of the Radziwià Âà  family in PolandâÂÂLithuania resulted in an offer from the royal Hohenzollern court to arrange a marriage between Frederica Louise, daughter of August Ferdinand, the brother of King Frederick William II, and the young Antoni Henryk. The backdrop to this marriage was the Koà Âciuszko Uprising and the fall of Poland as a result of the Third Partition. The marriage took place only after the collapse of Poland.
Following his 1796 marriage to Princess Louise of Prussia, his new family convinced him that he should be a mediator between the Poles living under the Third Partition after the failed Koà Âciuszko Uprising and the Prussian authorities in Berlin. Fluctuating between Berlin, Warsaw and Saint Petersburg, Radziwià Âà  developed the idea of making the province of South Prussia the nucleus of a renewed Polish kingdom, ruled by the Prussian king in personal union.
During Napoleon's 1806 campaign in Poland during the War of the Fourth Coalition, he tried to incite a Polish uprising against the French army and to convince Prince Józef Poniatowski to abandon his French allies and join the cause of the Russian Empire and Prussia. He failed on both occasions, when Prussia suffered a crushing defeat at the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt. Instead, Napoleon's expedition sparked the Greater Poland Uprising, which led to the establishment of the Duchy of Warsaw under the rule of King Frederick Augustus I of Saxony with Prince Poniatowski as War Minister. In the following years, Radziwià Âà  retired to his city palace in Berlin and concentrated on regaining his family's vast estates in the Russian partition from the hands of Emperor Alexander I of Russia.
Upon the Final Act of the 1815 Congress of Vienna, he was sent to the Greater-Poland capital Poznaà  as Duke-Governor and representative of Prussian King Frederick William III in the Grand Duchy of Posen. Struggling between his Polish subjects and the Prussian authorities, Radziwià Âà  found himself with little power, as effective power was executed by Oberpräsident Joseph Zerboni di Sposetti and the district governors heading the Regierungsbezirke of Posen and Bromberg. His daughter Elisa's engagement to Prussian Prince (later German Emperor) William I was broken in 1824.
Shortly after the outbreak of the 1830 November Uprising in Russian Congress Poland led by his brother Michaà  Gedeon Radziwià Âà Â, he was deprived of all powers, and the rule passed to Oberpräsident Eduard Heinrich von Flottwell. Next year the office of Duke-Governor was abolished, and the autonomy of the Grand Duchy was cancelled. It was incorporated into the Provinces of Prussia, renamed the "Province of Posen" in 1848.
In 1796 he married Princess Louise of Prussia (1770âÂÂ1836), the second daughter of Margravine Elisabeth Louise of Brandenburg-Schwedt and Prince Augustus Ferdinand of Prussia and hence a niece of the late Prussian king Frederick the Great. Together, they were the parents of:
Radziwià Âà  returned to his palace in Berlin, where he died on 7 April 1833. He was buried in the Poznaà  Cathedral. His children with Louise were Germanized and never returned to Poznaà Â; however, as owners of the Nieborów manor near Warsaw and huge family estates in today's Belarus, they paid frequent visits to other parts of Poland.
Antoni Radziwià Âà  is better known for his art patronage than for his ill-fated political career. His palaces in Berlin (the later Reich Chancellery of Otto von Bismarck), Poznaà  and Antonin near Ostrów Wielkopolski were known for great concerts performed by one of the most notable musicians of his times. Apart from the guitar, cello and opera concerts performed by Radziwià Âà  himself, among his guests were Niccolò Paganini (concert in Poznaà  on 19 May 1829), Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Frédéric Chopin and Ludwig van Beethoven. Chopin wrote his Introduction and Polonaise Op. 3 for cello and piano especially for Radziwià Âà Â. He also performed a concert in his palace in Poznaà  on 2 October 1828. Additionally, Chopin dedicated his Piano Trio Op. 8 to Radziwià Âà Â. Ludwig van Beethoven dedicated his Ouverture Op. 115 (Zur Namensfeier) to him, while Goethe participated in his efforts to write the music for his '. Maria Agata Szymanowska dedicated to him the Serenade pour le Pianoforte avec le accompagnement de violoncelle. He was also a notable sponsor of Polish theatres and his wife opened the first public school for girls in Poznaà  in 1830.