The Divorce of Louis XVI Augustus and Maria Antonia of Austria

[Kynan]

"When the King of France set aside his wife, the world went mad..."

- Theresa Reine, "Why France Fell"

In 1776, having been unable to enjoy the fruits of their marriage, Louis XVI, King of France publicly annulled his marriage to Austrian Archduchess Marie Antoinette. The claim was made that, due to his disgust of the nature of her background, and his distrust of the Austrian people, he was unable to consummate the marriage, and thus royal couple were separated and negotiations immediately began to return her to Austria.

The lead up to such a momentous decision was more private than might be suspected, and did not make itself known to any party outside the King’s own men until the full proposition to the Pope was written up, and even then it wouldn’t be until 1774, with the advice of his council, that Maria Antonia of Austria was informed that, shortly, she would be relieved of her position as Queen of France.

Now, the decision had not come easily, but there was some form of warning that, as of 1772, that the King was not happy with his wife. In 1771, he was recorded by his doctors to be unable to consummate the marriage with his wife, but had had a “nightly emission” thrice during the week, thus proving himself potentially able to produce a child by other means. In 1772, the Dauphin put forward a suite to the King of France that he felt it better to leave his marriage, but was turned away from his great-grandfather, who did not understand why his great-grandson would feel such distaste for a young woman he felt was quite pretty.

However, by 1773, as it became clear that Louis XV of ailing, the Dauphin was advised by those in his party to wait until he was in power, and in late 1773 a council of 23 men, both religious scholars and lawyers, to create the document that would annul his marriage to the Austrian Archduchess. He was cold to her in public, and snubbed her company in a way that read as displeasure. When ordered to her bed, he would take the route of pretending to be ill or, in one famous moment, standing at the door of their chamber throwing it open to reveal them both fully clothed, once the Dauphine had fallen asleep.

In 1774 the 19 year old Dauphin was risen to the title King of France, and by July of 1774 it was known that he was setting aside his wife. All of her candidates for leading positions at the court were ignored, and she was isolated even further from her husband, even losing contact with his sister in the lead up to their annulment. One of the first immediately consquences this lead to was that the Duke of Zweibrücken was snubbed soon after in his marriage to Maria Amalia of Saxony, who was now a leading candidate for the position of Queen of France.

Obviously, Austria was not supportive of this move, and the Emperor would, in late 1774, travel incognito to Versailles in order to attempt to mend the rift between his sister and the King of France. However, despite remaining in France for almost a month, he was only granted one meeting with his fellow monarch, and none with his sister, who would learn about the visit as soon as it was sure that her brother was out of reach.

The cruel was the King of France separated from his wife is often commented on, but it must be remembered that Louis Augustus had not wanted to marry an Austrian, and in one of the few moments of strength of character, had refused to accept the arrangement. His initial attempts in terms of the marriage were unsuccessful, and since he did not believe that he would possibly be in error, it was agreed by his doctors that the fault lay in his psychological aversion to Austrians. Thus, from that diagnosis in 1771, officially put to records in early 1772, in the beginnings of his decision to not continue his marriage to Maria Antonia.

There was not an immediate answer to the King of France, despite his eagerness to move on from what was now called “the doomed marriage”. The Emperor Joseph, at the advice of his mother, had sent warning to the Pope that he did not want his sister removed from the French Throne, and had sent ‘irrefutable proof’ that she and Louis Augustus had consummated their marriage and thus could not be separated. The message was framed as a moral call to arms rather than an attempt to continue influence in France. However, it was Austria’s word against France’s, and in late 1775, after over a year of bombardment from both sides to make a clear choice, he privates told the French ambassador that, until he had irrefutable and unbiased proof that Louis Augustus and Maria Antonia had not consummated their marriage, he could not in good faith agree to the annulment on the terms the King of France had asked for. Thus, Maria Antonia was suddenly made important again.

In early February of 1776, Louis Augustus made his first visit to his wife in over two years bringing with him the ‘Declaration of Non-consummation between the King of France and the Archduchess of Austria’, and asked her to sign it. It was then that Maria Antonia, who had spent the previous two years desperately trying to kindle any form of support in the court and amongst his family, begged him not to send her away. The Queen of France made it very clear that she feared for her position if she was set aside, and thus the King promised that he would not stand in the way of any further marriage of her, nor would he object to any potential bridegroom.

That was enough for Maria Antonia, and once that was in writing she would in May of 1776 sign the document and give her own testimony against their consummation, making clear that she had been willing as a partner, but her husband had proven unwilling. Thus, in July, the two were formally no longer husband and wife, and Maria Antonia began preparations to return to Austria.

A contract between Maria Amalia of Saxony and Louis Augustus was signed within days, but in August, when Maria Antonia attempted to leave for Austria, she was told she was expected to remain in France until the new Queen had arrived. This wasn’t, however, to her liking, and if the former Queen had been expected to be compliant to her former husband’s wishes, he proved mistaken. Until the Austrian woman left France, she was the financial responsibility of the King, and thus she began to spend large. By December, the lady got exactly what she wanted and began her journey to Vienna.

Maria Amalia of Saxony would arrive in March of 1777.

 

[Benevolence]

Interesting premise

 

[ByzantineLover]

Watching with keen interest.

 

[Kynan]

“When the former Queen of France arrived in Vienna to a sympathetic yet disappointed mother and brother, she expected very little in the immediate future. Having become a symbol of the failed French alliance, she initially felt isolated, and in a letter to her former sister-in-law Elisabeth de France, she spoke of feeling a disappointment. Still young and famously beautiful, she struggled under the feeling that she was an embarrassment to her family and an unlikely candidate for future marriage prospects.

Initially, it did seem likely that Maria Antonia, young but seemingly unlucky, would be cast aside and left to a nunnery, like her sisters Maria Anna and Maria Elisabeth before her, each unlucky in their own right. However, that would prove not to be the case, for a former suitor to the Hapsburgs was reappear…”

- Martin Harman, "Austria Married the World"

In late January of 1777, Maria Antonia, Archduchess of Austria, was safely installed in the company of her mother, who made sure her daughter knew they regretted ever sending her off to France. The Empress, in the initial excitement of a returning child, made sure it was known for and wide her disgust of the King of France.

“The French,” she said, “are lesser Kings and lesser men.”

Shortly after her arrival, the young woman would receive a full medical examination by the royal physicians, who were able to publicly declare her a virgin, and fully capable of producing offspring. This would prove important to Maria Antonia, who would maintain until her death that the King of France simply did not want to touch her, and that she was willing. It seems the idea, potentially held by her disappointed mother, that she had spurned his advances and made her own doom were worrying for the young woman. She feared becoming known as sexless and unattractive, particularly as she wanted to remarry as soon as possible.

As it so happened, her brother the Emperor began negotiations with Spain, for a match between the Infante Antonio Pascual and his sister, with the suggestion that Antonio would be given a Kingdom like his brother. However, with the sudden onslaught of the ‘War of the Bavarian Succession’, Maria Antonia became a strong bargaining chip, and on his mother’s advice, Joseph offered his sister’s hand in marriage to the Duke of Zweibrücken with the promise that, when he inherited the lands of Charles II Theodore, Elector of Bavaria, the next heirs would be the Hapsburgs, not his brother. It would prevent a full scale war of succession, as the Emperor promised that, should his terms not be met, he would storm Bavaria to take what he considered his.

The Duke of Zweibrücken, formerly Maria Amalia, Archduchess of Austria’s beloved, arrived in Vienna and immediately to negotiating a more even marriage contract, in order to marry the Archduchess. Charles Augustus, formerly a lowly catch for an Austrian Archduchess, was now to many, clearly heir presumptive to Bavaria, and since he had been spurned by the Saxons, he felt it right to retry for an Austrian bride, and this time successfully. As part of agreement, the Duke of Zweibrücken accepted and supported the exchange of lands in Bavaria for lands in Austrian Burgundy.

The two were married in April of 1778, with the Archduchess Maria Antonia joining her husband in matrimony, and by September, with the anticipation that the Archduchess of Austria was pregnant, news came from France. The new Queen, Maria Amalia of Saxony, had delivered a stillborn child, strangled in the womb. In early February of the next year, Maria Antonia would deliver a small but healthy son, named Maximilian Joseph.

 

[kasumigenx]

In late January of 1777, Maria Antonia, Archduchess of Austria, was safely installed in the company of her mother, who made sure her daughter knew they regretted ever sending her off to France. The Empress, in the initial excitement of a returning child, made sure it was known for and wide her disgust of the King of France.

“The French,” she said, “are lesser Kings and lesser men.”

Shortly after her arrival, the young woman would receive a full medical examination by the royal physicians, who were able to publicly declare her a virgin, and fully capable of producing offspring. This would prove important to Maria Antonia, who would maintain until her death that the King of France simply did not want to touch her, and that she was willing. It seems the idea, potentially held by her disappointed mother, that she had spurned his advances and made her own doom were worrying for the young woman. She feared becoming known as sexless and unattractive, particularly as she wanted to remarry as soon as possible.

As it so happened, her brother the Emperor began negotiations with Spain, for a match between the Infante Antonio Pascual and his sister, with the suggestion that Antonio would be given a Kingdom like his brother. However, with the sudden onslaught of the ‘War of the Bavarian Succession’, Maria Antonia became a strong bargaining chip, and on his mother’s advice, Joseph offered his sister’s hand in marriage to the Duke of Zweibrücken with the promise that, when he inherited the lands of Charles II Theodore, Elector of Bavaria, the next heirs would be the Hapsburgs, not his brother. It would prevent a full scale war of succession, as the Emperor promised that, should his terms not be met, he would storm Bavaria to take what he considered his.

The Duke of Zweibrücken, formerly Maria Amalia, Archduchess of Austria’s beloved, arrived in Vienna and immediately to negotiating a more even marriage contract, in order to marry the Archduchess. Charles Augustus, formerly a lowly catch for an Austrian Archduchess, was now to many, clearly heir presumptive to Bavaria, and since he had been spurned by the Saxons, he felt it right to retry for an Austrian bride, and this time successfully. As part of agreement, the Duke of Zweibrücken accepted and supported the exchange of lands in Bavaria for lands in Austrian Burgundy.

The two were married in April of 1778, with the Archduchess Maria Antonia joining her husband in matrimony, and by September, with the anticipation that the Archduchess of Austria was pregnant, news came from France. The new Queen, Maria Amalia of Saxony, had delivered a stillborn child, strangled in the womb. In early February of the next year, Maria Antonia would deliver a small but healthy son, named Maximilian Joseph.

What about Marie Antoinette eloping with Fersen.

 

[Kynan]

What about Marie Antoinette eloping with Fersen.

I definitely considered it, but the timeline didn’t match up. He didn’t return to France OTL until 1778 after a brief visit in 1774 and it was probably after the 1778 visit that their affair began, if it happened at all. He might figure into her life in the following years, but for now she’s Duchess of Zweibrücken

 

[Avrorrange]

As part of agreement, the Duke of Zweibrücken accepted and supported the exchange of lands in Bavaria for lands in Austrian Burgundy.

The two were married in April of 1778, with the Archduchess Maria Antonia joining her husband in matrimony, and by September, with the anticipation that the Archduchess of Austria was pregnant, news came from France. The new Queen, Maria Amalia of Saxony, had delivered a stillborn child, strangled in the womb. In early February of the next year, Maria Antonia would deliver a small but healthy son, named Maximilian Joseph.

Not if anything to say about it Prussia have.

 

[Kynan]

Not if anything to say about it Prussia have.

Oh that’ll be in coming updates. This is the lead up not the whole story.

 

[Kynan]

“…and her face was smashed into the inner carvings of the carriage, leaving a large and odd shaped bruise across her left cheek, which was declared by the Duke of Orleans to be in the shape of France itself. The young Princess was forced to travel in the carriage behind her official one, and due to the overspill of the other carriages it was completely full and wildly uncomfortable. Her descriptions of the trip likened it to travelling through hell, but she was sure she’d enjoy France once she was safely married. She did not…”

- Thomas Broome, “Marie Amalie: The Other Queen”

There were problems the moment Maria Amalia of Saxony arrived in France. The carriage bringing her to building she was being handed over lost its wheel, and the Saxon Princess actually bruised the side of her face during the incident. She was also made unaware that all of her possessions would not be travelling with her to Versailles, and thus cried “loudly and with great passion” when two dogs, gifted to her prior to the journey to France, were taken away and given away. She made a better impression otherwise than her predecessor, however, simply by not committing any major faux-pas and mostly keeping her mouth shut.

The immediate difference in how the court took to Maria Amalia might have spelt success, but as it turned out, his first bride’s Austrian heritage wasn’t the only issue in their consummation. While he had, in the interim “proved himself” to doctors by sleeping with a serving woman, he still struggled to perform consistently with his new bride, and she is said to have remained distant, complaining that she was away from her mother. However, despite repeated requests, Maria Amalia’s mother did not travel to France, and instead Louis asked for his sister Elisabeth to take her into her fold and keep her away potential pitfalls, but instead the Saxon Princess drew close to the Savoid Princesses, who sympathised with the young woman’s discomfort in the suffocating French Court.

By the time she had been in Versailles six months, in August, she was known as the “trickster Queen” by those that loved her, and to most as a troubling young woman. Cheerfully uncomfortable, she eagerly played pranks with servants and courtiers alike, and in one famous incident stole away to her husband’s sanctuary and stole all the keys he had made. In particular, Maria Amalia took to in turn supporting and harassing the Comtesse d’Artois, acting as her main companion during her pregnancy with the Duc de Berri, but within days of her return to court she was locking her in rooms and in one famous case, dropped mice into her wig. However, the two remained close.

Regardless of her seeming enjoyment, the Queen of France remained incredibly lonely, and once she was pregnant for the first time, she began shutting herself off from those surrounding her. If the constant mischief and pranks had been annoying, the Court actively worried about their Queen’s sudden departure into the melancholy, potentially triggered by her former suitor’s marriage to her husband’s former wife.

“She sat as a doll most days, unwilling to do more than a short walk around the gardens. Those who thought they knew the Queen thought her sad, but it is hard to say, as no record says anything more than she was blank…”

- Jeremy Stutton, “The Replacement”

Maria Amalia often felt lesser than her predecessor, and in later communication with her family, lamented that the people thought her to lack the deportment of a queen. Indeed, despite the unpopularity of the Austrian Archduchess, she had left behind her a myth of a regal and beautiful young woman, approachable and yet magnificent. As the memory of her grew fainter, there was a sense that their former Queen was better than their new one, and thus unfortunately the new Queen was thus put into stark juxtaposition to everything Maria Antonia represented.

For one, she lacked the innate grace and deportment of her former. Not a bad dancer, she never fully mastered the Versailles glide, and once pregnant began a bad habit of rolling her shoulders forward and slouching when tired. Her general lack of elegance and middling beauty was often mocked, and in one famous scene between the King and his brother Artois, they both agreed their wives were ugly, but the younger would insist “you had a pretty wife the first time”. Indeed, by the time Maria Amalia miscarried a stillborn son around the time Maria Antonia was announcing her first pregnancy, the court had made up its mind that she was a bad trade and the King was wrong.

Maria Amalia’s political powers were also shown to be minimal in late 1778 when, after begging her husband not to take part in the Bavarian War of Succession, which remained a touchy issue, Louis XVI invaded Austrian Burgundy to take “the rightful lands of France, stolen by the hated Austrians”, in an alliance with the Prussians, who in turn invaded Bavaria for their considered rightful heir, the Duke of Zweibrücken’s brother Maximilian, who agreed to marry the Princess Elisabeth of France, should their war be successful. Maximilian, a Colonel in the French Army, was immediately raised to the rank Major-General and brought to the court to meet with his future brother-in-law and wife. He was considered hard and the Queen thought him older than he was. However, the young man began his leading of troops.

 

[ranichi17]

I definitely considered it, but the timeline didn’t match up. He didn’t return to France OTL until 1778 after a brief visit in 1774 and it was probably after the 1778 visit that their affair began, if it happened at all. He might figure into her life in the following years, but for now she’s Duchess of Zweibrücken

I, for one, still think they were just close friends the same way Fersen is to Louis himself, and people were just willing to jump onto any scandal they could about her just because she's L'Autrichienne. So, good call on not using that.

 

[JonasResende]

Well, this is interesting.

Antoinette seems to be slightly happier, and her husband being (as usual) behind the curve in realizing what he traded away. Also, Antoinette's mother was never addressed as the empress after '65, in correspondence she was always referred to as "Her Imperial Majesty, the Queen of Hungary". Particularly by the French.

I think Karl August's secret handshake with Josef II about Bavaria is going to piss some people off, no end. But, the good news is that so long as he and Antoinette have surviving kids who are also male, it keeps his brother away from the title (as well as from marriage: Maximilian Josef only married OTL after Karl August's son by Marie Amalie of Saxony died, which seems to indicate that before then it wasn't really considered necessary).

But I'll be interested to see this where it goes.

PS: The demonym for someone from Savoy is a Savoyard or Sabaudian, and I was actually hoping that the Savoyard that Marie Amelie was befriending was the comtesse de Provence, maybe leading to a sort of rapprochement in that marriage. But, still, the comtesse d'Artois is not a bad second.

 

[Kynan]

“Few rulers succeeded in less than Louis XVI of France. He lost his war, his dignity and ultimately his wife in one fatal year…”

- Francis Holmes, “Unsuccessful Rulers”

With the birth of a son in the last hours of 1779, Louis XVI Augustus should have felt vindicated. He had met his former wife son for son, had proven himself fertile and now should have held all the cards in his hands. But even as the Bavarian War began, he found himself unsupported on all sides. His brothers, despite their kindness to his new wife, were distinctly affronted Louis Augustus had had the nerve to father a son, and even his wife struggled with the burden of being “Mother of the Nation”, as he attempted to position her. Maria Amalia would reject efforts by the French Court to have her take on a matronly role, which ultimately led to her neglecting even those few duties she had to visit and receive reports about her son. In her own words:

“He is the nation’s son, and let them be his mother, for I am barren otherwise.”

– Marie Amalie of Saxony, Queen Consort of France (1784)

Maria Amalia would, in fact, fail to conceive for almost 6 years following the birth of her son, and it has been suggested that, with her lack of emotional bond with her husband and their differing timetables, the two simply failed to meet. Regardless of the reason, no Duc de Burgundy arrived in the coming years, and instead, the royal couple stalled, creating almost two separate social grounds within the court: the King’s men and the Queen’s court.

But the King’s marriage wasn’t the only issue he faced, nor the biggest. In fact, the biggest issue for the King of France was that, despite making good progress in the ‘War of the Bavarian Succession’, it was both financially draining and politically unpopular. Despite Prussia’s involvement, invading Charles Theodore’s Bavarian domains in a joint effort with the French, other great powers refused to take part in the war efforts. The main issue for Louis Augustus was that, with his current marriage, he had expected the Saxon armies to come to arms, but that was not to be. He may of married their Princess, but the Saxon royal family did not agree with his stance, and in 1780 they welcomed the Duchess of Zweibrücken, pregnant for the second time, into their court as a guest of the Duchess of Saxony. This was the closest they came to taking sides in the war and, due to the standard of isolating themselves from Maria Amalia in France, the Queen of France found herself falling even deeper into a depressive state.

For Maria Antonia, Saxony was made unbearable by the collective crowding of her sister-in-law. A stiff woman who felt deeply both of the miscarriages she had endured, she took special interest in her brother’s pretty, graceful bride. Initially, the two got along fine, although the Duchess of Zweibrücken wrote to her brother that she hated the constant companionship of one so devoid of humour. However, the true rivalry between the women began in February 7th, 1781, with the birth of Maria Theresa of Zweibrücken-Birkenfeld, because shortly after the birth, Maria Antonia discovered her husband had agreed that their infant daughter should be raised by the Duchess of Saxony.

Now, up until this point, the Austrian Archduchess had been entirely submissive when it came to her husband’s decisions. She knew that, during the move to the Saxon court it made more sense for her son to remain in Vienna, and she had understood the political importance of staying in the Saxon Court, to prove their loyalty to her husband rather than the French. However, she had been led to believe that, once her daughter was born, she could return to Vienna, with her child. And instead, she now found the Duchess of Saxony, pregnant herself now, planned to keep her precious daughter with her, and marry her to her son, should she have one.

In short, the Duchess of Zweibrücken was furious, and despite the Emperor’s insistence that her fury was silly and unbecoming, she remained resolute: Maria Theresa was returning to Vienna with her. And thus, agreements were made, and preparations began. But, at the last moment, the child went ill, and with so much preparation behind her, Maria Antonia was forced to leave her in Dresden with Maria Amalia, Duchess of Saxony until she could be organised for the trip to Vienna. But as weeks turned to months, Maria Antonia was forced to reckon that her daughter remained in the Duchess of Saxony’s care, and thus in July of 1782, with the birth of Maximilian Charles of Saxony, she agreed that her daughter could remain as the future Duke of Saxony’s bride.

These domestic squabbles painted a bleak backdrop to a war most found ridiculous, and in 1785, after major losses throughout the second half of 1784, Louis Augustus was forced to withdraw his troops, and fire Maximilian of Zweibrücken from his army. With the death of Benedita of Portugal the previous year, in childbirth with a stillborn daughter, Elisabeth of France was instead sent to Portugal as a wife for Jose, Prince of Brazil, and the King’s favourite sister was suddenly torn from her homeland, and her hope for a future as a nun, to the Portuguese court, which proved to be the most successful marriage of her siblings.

Louis II Augustus was a failure in the eyes of Europe, and in 1786, despite joy in the miraculous new pregnancy of his Queen, his law to end serfdom in the whole of France was rejected, as were many of his proposed reforms. This largescale sense of loss, the French king withdrew from court life as much as he realistically could, becoming almost a “monk king”. The royal couple were known as “Shadow and Mist”, for the King was often gone and the Queen cried a lot.

In Vienna, the Duchess of Zweibrücken enjoyed the celebrations with her husband, and in 1786 a second son to the couple was born, named Joseph Michael of Zweibrücken-Birkenfeld. However, it would be in the coming years, without the glory and distraction of war, that Maria Antonia of Austria would find the true character of her husband, and how similar he was to his sister.

Needless to say, the marriage became fraught relatively quickly.

 

[Kynan]

The French Revolution ended with three major successes:

• The full and complete move from a Absolutist to a Constitutional Monarchy.
  
  
• The end of Catholicism as the official French religion.
  
  
• The rise of the House of Orleans as the power behind the throne.

These were not, completely, the motives of the party responsible for the Revolution, who titles themselves ‘The Liberty People’. This group of highly motivated academics and political scientists initially envisioned reform in a government that had gone bankrupt with unnecessary wars and had lowered France’s prestige on an international scale. They wanted a government free from religion and more equal to the common public. And thus began the first of a series of offenses in France, spawning outwards from Paris and snaking out across the country.

Initially, the people were not galvanised by the high minded speeches of the intellectual elite. And thus, the monarchy ignored the threat ‘The Liberty People’ represented, instead enjoying the festivities surrounding the birth of the King’s daughter, the Princess Marie Sophie de France. Coins commemorating the birth of the Princess were sent as gifts across the nobility, but in 1786, a more important event would take place amongst the French peoples: the ‘Storming of the Debtor’s Prisons’.

In early 1786, a man named Francois Dubois marched into a Debtor’s Prison in Marseille with 200 men and released every man in the building. This led to hundreds of Debtor’s Prisons across the country, and by July, the people were galvanised against the monarchy and, by August, a cadet branch of ‘The Liberty People’, calling themselves ‘The People for the Freedom from the Shackles of Religion’, emerged as a force against the Catholic Church in France.

Amongst those who became immediately invested in the Revolution were the Orleans clan, in particular Louis Philippe d’Orleans, Duke of Chartres, who became an advocate for the reforms the people were suggesting. Meeting with Francis Dubois in 1787, he offered 1,000,000 livres to the revolution, provided that he remain the noble head and ambassador, as other noblemen had taken to “the interest and education of democracy”, which threatened his position of influence. Thus, when the people of France stormed Versailles to bring the King and his family to Paris, he rose beside the King's carriage.

In 1788, Louis Augustus was a man isolated in his own capital. The revolution wasn’t violent, but the force behind not only it’s principles but it’s popularity was undeniable. With a miserable wife by his side, pregnant again 1788, he had no choice by go along as much as he was willing, and in July of 1788, he signed for the Duke of Orleans to be Regent to his son, should he be needed for such a position. In one of her last acts as Queen, Maria Amalia spoke out against such a decision, deriding her husband and decreeing that, should her son need a Regent, it would be her. It’s been suggested that, during this time, she had taken a lover in the Spanish born, French Ambassador Pedro Martin, who is rumoured to have been her child’s actual father. Regardless of that possibility, Maria Amalia portrayed herself as a suffering wife to her Kingly husband, which earned her a reputation as a nag amongst political satirists. The woman that for years had been portrayed as a weepy, boring statue of a person was suddenly a fishwife with a tongue of fire. Regardless of how she was seen, it was not for long, as she would die in February of 1789, two weeks before her husband was bullied into signing into a constitutional monarchy.

The Queen of France left behind three children, the fair Dauphin and his sisters, the also fair Marie Sophie and the surprisingly dark but no one wanted to discuss it Elisabeth Louise, who’s birth had been the reason she had died. Her husband, for all his neglect of her, mourned his wife. The funeral was lavish, and as the Revolution began getting more and more virulent, and the price of food higher and higher, it was probably a good thing that in May of 1790, the King choked on a piece of fish. This did not kill him, but what did was the actions of the guard that attempted to help him cough it out. It seems the guard had hit the King on the back in panic, causing him to fall into the table and, unluckily, break his rib. The fish was gone but the rib pierced his lung, causing him to die.

Thus, the Orleans Regency began.

 

[ranichi17]

Christ, that sounds like it came straight from a political sitcom and I love it.

 

[Kynan]

In 1787, after being assured her new home was suitable, Maria Antonia, Duchess of Zweibrücken, travelled from Vienna to Zweibrücken Castle with her two sons, arriving in March. There, she found a magnificent building filled with people, none of whom were her husband. He would not, in fact, arrive to meet his wife and sons until early April. The reason for this is muddled, but what truly annoyed the Duchess of Zweibrücken was that she had been left to fend for herself, and since the servants of the castle did not speak any language she knew, excepting a French chef who acted as a translator for her, she was left uncomfortably isolated until he arrived.

While the Duchess of Zweibrücken conceived almost immediately after his arrival, giving birth to a premature son, Frederick Jospeh, who died within minutes of his birth, tensions rose between Charles Augustus and his wife. For it seems, the when the Duke of Zweibrücken arrived back to his home, be brought his sister and brother-in-law, the Count and Countess Palatine of Birkenfeld-Gelnhausen, their two children. The young Maria Elisabeth of Birkenfeld-Gelnhausen was presented to Maria Antonia as not only her responsibility, but her future daughter-in-law.

Yes, with the arrival of the sweet natures, docile Marie Elisabeth, the Duchess of Zweibrücken found her plans for her son spoiled. In constant contact with sister, the Queen of Naples, she had discussed a marriage between her son and the Princess Maria Antoinetta of Naples, whose name was in honour of her and who the Queen of Naples hoped to marry to her sister’s son. Thus, friction rose up between the two again, and in 1788, fed up with the continuing friction between herself and her husband, Maria Antonia visited for a time the Residenz, the royal palace that the Elector of Bavaria and his wife presided in. During her time there, she reportedly had an affair with the Elector, enjoyed the company of the Electress, and in 1789, agreed to return to her husband’s home while her brother, Leopold, Archduke of Austria, paid a visit, partially to gain permission to visit Vienna again.

It was during this time her final pregnancy began, and following the birth of her final children in 1790, Maria Antonia gained permission from her husband to take some of the children to live, at her brother’s expense, at the Imperial court, in part to visit her sister Maria Carolina, who travelled with her daughter Luisa of Naples when she was married to the Grand Duke of Tuscany. It was during this stay that the Duke of Zweibrücken began openly living with his lover, a woman only referred to Madame de Dublin, later discovered to not even be of Irish descent, but rather a Scottish actress, who signed her will Catherine Diggy.

Regardless of her husband’s doings, Maria Antonia stayed at the court throughout 1791, and only in early 1792 was any effort made for her to return to her husband’s side, in the form of sending her second son and younger of the twin daughters she had born back to Zweibrücken, while she remained in Vienna to nurse the sickly Charlotte Renata of Zweibrücken-Birkenfeld. However, by the time the Countess Charlotte was cleared for return to her home, news arrived the Holy Roman Emperor had died, leaving the young Archduke Franz, Maria Antonia’s nephew, as the new Emperor. Initially, he was glad for his aunts support, but by the beginning of 1793, during his first attempts at allying with the newly risen Orleans clan, he suggested that Maria Antonia and Maria Carolina either travel to Tuscany with his brother and his bride, or back to Naples. The two chose to travel to Tuscany to await the birth of the Grand Duke’s second child, a healthy son named Francesco, but in 1795, Maria Carolina returned to Naples, leaving her sister to stay in Tuscany, where she heard the news that her husband was dead.

Yes in 1795, without warning, Charles Augustus collapsed while in the company of his mistress, and thus Maria Antonia was forced to return to Zweibrücken, leaving behind Charlotte Renata in Tuscany in what was meant to be a temporary arrangement, to see to the funeral. The Dowager Duchess of Zweibrücken, distraught that they had parted on such unfortunate terms, openly wept during the funeral, and rebuked the suggestion that she marry the also now widowed Elector of Bavaria for the immediate future, claiming a need for a full year of mourning before such an arrangement could take place. However, her main concern at this time was not her respectability, or her widowed status, but her son, who by 1795 was moving away from her own belief system.

Maximilian I Joseph, Duke of Zweibrücken, was a pretty young man, who by 1795 was a youth regularly described as both lusty and rude. However, those traits were not the ones that filled his mother with dread, but rather his interest in Prussia and the Prussian religion. Having travelled in the previous years to Prussia, he had enjoyed the hospitality of the King of Prussia Frederick Willian II. Their friendship seems to have partially been inspired by Frederick’s mysticism, and in 1794, they were to have had their fates read by a mystic priest, which predicted that they would rule together, as allies. Regardless, the two were evidentally close, so close that in 1795, when the Elector of Bavaria knew he would not marry Maria Antonia, he rushed into a marriage with the Archduchess Maria Amalia of Austria, the sister to the Holy Roman Emperor. Assured that she was fertile and healthy, he was to find his new bride to be quite childlike and awkward, and in 1797, she would die in childbirth to a stillborn daughter, leaving him unmarried by his death the next year.

However, during those 3 years of uncertainty, a marriage was to take place between Maximilian Joseph and Frederick II of Prussia’s niece, the 9 years elder Princess Louise. This came by for a variety of reasons, but the main one was that Maximilian Joseph hoped to move Zweibrücken, and Bavaria in future, into the Lutheran religion and a more Prussia style government overall. This came, in part, to his friendship with the Prussian royal family, which was further enhanced by the arrival of Prince Augustus of Prussia to Zweibrücken, in part to protect the interests of his sister in a foreign court. The two would become close friends during this time, and Augustus of Prussia would act as the godfather to the Countess Palatine Louise Claudine, the first child of the Duke of Zweibrücken and his bride, in 1798, two months before Maximilian Joseph rose to the throne.

During these initial years, Maria Antonia attempted multiple times to establish herself as Regent to her son, attempting to bring him towards Hapsburg interests and even, in 1796, writing to her sister in Naples to send her daughter, Maria Antoinetta, to Zweibrücken before it was too late. Unfortunately, a decade of running around Europe and forcible ignorance around politics made the Dowager Duchess of Zweibrücken clumsy in her power grabs, and in 1797, upon his marriage to Louise of Prussia, Maximilian Joseph removed his mother from Zweibrücken Castle, agreeing to pay her an allowance while she travelled through Europe, and agreed that she might take his brother, Jospeh Michael, with her. However, the young Maria Gregoria was to remain at her brother’s court, due to her age.

Thus, Maria Antonia travelled to Vienna, and then to Tuscany, to collect her other daughter, who she refused to send back to Zweibrücken. Instead, she settled into the court of Naples, to enjoy the company of her favourite sister and raise her two children for a time, until her sudden death in 1801.