At the age of 18 Emanuel was imprisoned and sentenced to death by the Nazis for being opposed to their rule. After escaping his sentence he next had to escape from the approaching Soviets as his homeland Saxony became a part of communist East Germany as World War II wound down. After the war he moved to Switzerland where he began working in the financial services sector. Also being a talented painter Emanuel had a number of his works exhibited.

Although Marie Vassiltchikov recounts in her book The Berlin Diaries 1940-45 the story of the 16-year-old Hereditary Prince Maria Emanuel paying her a visit to seek her help in finding a bride, as he felt it was his dynastic obligation to start a family early, Emanuel would not in fact marry until his 37th birthday. His wife was Princess Anastasia of Anhalt (born 1940), whom he married on 31 January 1963 in Vevey, Switzerland. They had no children.

Maria Emanuel became head of the Royal House of Saxony upon the death of his father on 9 August 1968.

As Maria Emanuel fathered no legitimate children, he had acknowledged as his eventual heir Prince Alexander of Saxe-Gessaphe, the son of his eldest sister Princess Anna and her late husband Prince Robert of Gessaphe (or "Assaphe"/"Afif", descendants of a Lebanese Christian family which ruled a province north of Beirut). Maria Emanuel adopted Alexander on 1 June 1999, who had married Princess Gisela of Bavaria in 1987. In 1997 the surviving male dynasts of the Albertine line of Wettins consented to the Margrave's decision, Subsequently, his brother Albert stated that he no longer accepted the decision.

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Wikipedia