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Characteristics of marie antoinette as one of the causes of the french revolution
The truth about marie antoinette
The truth about marie antoinette
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will be discussing the life of Marie Antoinette (1755-1793) and the impact she had on the French Revolution. This paper will include the actions she took to prompt the revolution, the tendencies and character she reflected as a heroine and Queen and the impact she had on the women’s suffrage movement.
Marie Antoinette was born in Vienna, Austria in 1755. At the young age of 15 years old, she was married off to Louis XVI who was the future king of France. Antoinette soon became a popular topic to discuss all around. “After the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789, the royal family was forced to live under the supervision of revolutionary authorities.” Soon after the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1793, the king was sentenced
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to death and Marie was arrested, convicted and then was sent to death by guillotine on October 16th of the same year. The beginning of Marie Antoinette’s life exposed to the public was when she was married as a teenager on May 16th, 1770 in Versailles. “There is no evidence that Marie Antoinette ever said that starving peasants should “eat cake” if they had no bread.
In fact, the story of a fatuous noblewoman who said “Let them eat cake!” appears in the philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Confessions, which was written around 1766 (when Marie Antoinette was just 11 years old)” (Marie-Antoinette).
The seemingly glamorous life lived in the spotlight was not all it appeared to be for Marie Antoinette. Her life was by no means an easy one to live out. The downsides of this were that it strained her marriage, had very little time to herself and held few official responsibilities. “Widely circulated newspapers and inexpensive pamphlets poked fun at the queen’s profligate behavior and spread outlandish, even pornographic rumors about her.” Many people formed a trend by saying that Marie Antoinette was “to blame for all of France’s problems.” This became too much for her to handle on her own.
Although a common belief was held that Marie Antoinette prompted the French Revolution, it was actually not true at all. “Eighteenth-century colonial wars–particularly the American Revolution, in which the French had intervened on behalf of the colonists–had created a tremendous debt for the French state.” Most people who possessed land in France were not taxed on how much money they had. Middle class and the poor became even poorer due to high taxes and they grew angry towards the royals and their
carelessness. A wider ranged tax system was attempted to be implemented by Louis XVI, but it was denied. Many people blamed Marie Antoinette for this and called her “Madame Veto.” The clergy, common people and the nobility met in the city of Versailles in 1789 to reform France. Several of these groups desired to stick to their old ways and not implement change, even in the taxation system. Members of the “third estate” formed a group known as the “National Assembly.” This gave French society a long awaited stability from the government..
Marie Antoinette was born on November 2, 1755 at the Hofburg Palace in Vienna, Austria, and in a rich family. She was one of the fifteen children of Holy Roman Emperor Francis I and Empress Maria Theresa. She was the youngest daughter but second youngest child among those fifteen children. She lacked of education, so her handwriting was not easy to understand. Instead of liberal art lessons, she had more interested in entertainment lessons, so she was educated on dance, music, manners, and appearance. With these entertainment lessons, she learnt them better than liberal art lessons. She also learnt three languages included Italian, French, and German, and history of Austria and France. But at the age of ten, she still had trouble in reading, writing, and speaking.
This oppression of the Third Estate along with the financial problems that fell on the common people would lead to the French Revolution. Overall, the people of France revolted against the monarchy because of the unsuccessful estate system and the inequality it led to, because of the new enlightenment ideas that inspired them, and because of the failures of the monarchy.
In the book, Marie Antoinette: The Last Queen of France , the author, Evelyne Lever, paints a beautiful portrayal of the life of Marie Antoinette; from an Austrian princess to Queen of France to her untimely death at the end of a guillotine. Marie Antoinette was the fifteenth child born to the Empress Maria Theresa and Francis I, the Holy Roman Emperor. She lived a carefree childhood until she was strategically married and sent to France when she was fourteen years old. The marriage between Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, the future King of France, was meant to bring Austria and France closer together politically. Unfortunately, that did not happen; instead the monarchy collapsed with Marie Antoinette managing to alienate and offend a vast
Louis XVI & Marie Antoinette Louis XVI was king of France from 1774 until his execution in 1792. He was married to Marie Antoinette. King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were unfavored by the French society. King Louis XVI was an indecisive king, who did not do anything to help France in their time of debt and need. Marie Antoinette was known as Madame Deficit because of her excessive spending. King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were important because of their rule, the French society was unhappy and started to rebel leading to the French Revolution.
Catherine de Medici’s culpability for the turbulent events in France in 1559-72 remains a topic of some debate. Highly personal protestant pamphleteers associated Catherine with sinister comparisons to the contemporary evil Machiavelli which eventually developed into the ‘Black Legend’. Jean.H. Mariégol consolidates this interpretation, overwhelmingly assuming Catherine’s wickedness; the Queen Mother was deemed to be acting for ‘personal aggrandizement’ without an interest in the monarchy. Neale provides a corrective arguing a ‘dominant maternalism’ drove Catherine’s policies. Sutherland critiques Neale, suggesting he is guilty of using misconceived qualifying phrases from the ‘Black Legend’ stemming from the contemporary pamphlets, instead Sutherland and Heller attempt to disentangle Catherine from the context of the xenophobic Protestant pamphleteers that shaped much of Catherine’s historical analysis thus far, revealing the ‘politique’ whose moderate policies were a force for stability. Knecht is most convincing in his assertion that whilst the ‘Black Legend’ is a misrepresentation of her character and policies, Sutherland goes too far in whitewashing Catherine. Ironically, Catherine as a ‘politique’ aimed for complex policies and yet her role in French politics was over-simplified by contemporaries and arguably even by modern historians contributing to overly polarised interpretations. Instead we should bear in mind the violent pressures Catherine faced in the context of the collapse of monarchical authority and follow the more nuanced interpretation of her role.
In Marie Antoinette’s Letter to Her Mother, 1773, she writes to her mother about her visit to Paris where she walked with her husband through the Tuileries. From the information at the top of the letter, it’s notable that she was in Versailles at the time she wrote the letter, on the 14th of June, 1773. This letter was written in a time of financial chaos, where the country was bankrupt and looking for solutions to the increasing problems of the three Estates. Antoinette’s husband, Louis XVI, was to replace Louis XV once he passed on, and the people that crowded the Tuileries were looking to him for change, particularly under the rule of an absolute monarchy.
Marie Antoinette was the wife of King Louis XVI of France, she was an Austrian princess who was sent to France to marry the dauphin of France at fourteen years old. She spent her time dancing at parties, playing cards and shopping. Marie Antoinette was very profligate in her spending, she didn’t know about the people of France’s suffering, she was also a good person. Marie Antoinette is seen as a villain because she was oblivious to how much debt they were in and how the people were starving, she didn’t consummate her marriage early, she was arrogant and petty, but towards the end of her life she was a good person and great mother .
The great Madame Pompadour was born Jeanne Antoinette Poisson, on December 29, 1721. She was bourgeois, a commoner, and all in all, had a rather happy childhood. Her parents took her to see a fortune teller who told her that she would 'capture the heart of a king'. Her family teased her about her fate for the rest of her life, calling her 'Reinette' which means little queen. As a child she was taught to sing, memorize plays, paint, play the clavichord, and do most ladylike arts.
Marie Antoinette Josèphe Jeanne de Habsbourg-Lorraine was born in the mid-eighteenth century as an archduchess and princess, to Maria Teresa, the Austrian Empress, at the very apex of the European hierarchal pyramid. She was an essential part to the oldest royal European house, as it became known that her sole duty in life was to unite the two great powers and long-term enemies of Austria-Hungary and France by marriage. She was brutally overthrown by her own starving people and portrayed to the world as a villain and abuser of power, whereas sympathy for the young queen should be shown.
The French revolution was also caused by a bad ruler and a bad economy. During the early 1780's a big percent of annual budget went towards king Louis XVI's lavish estate at Versailles. France also had no central bank, no paper currency, no ways of getting more money, and an out-dated tax system which only taxed the poor who had no money to begin with. Signs of revolution first appeared when the peasants stormed the fortress known as the Bastille looking for gun powder.
Born on November 2nd, 1755 in Hoffenberg palace in Vienna, Austria, Marie Antoinette had many brothers and sisters to share the huge palace along with her mother and father. Louis XVI’s grandfather Louis XV believed that Marie needed training to prepare to be so, he sent a tutor to help her. The tutor stated that Marie was "more intelligent than has been generally supposed," but rumors later on spread that Marie was very stupid, for a queen’s standards. The tutor also said: "She is rather lazy and extremely frivolous, she is hard to teach," which showed that Marie Antoinette had an excitable side to her and would likely lean towards breaking the rules. Looking into Marie’s future she had a wild side, which was even noticeable at a v...
Marie Antonia Josepha Joanna was born on November 2, 1755 (biography.com editors). Marie was born in Vienna of Austria to her mother named Maria Theresa and her father Francis I Holy Roman Emperor. She was the 15th child of the Holy Roman Emperor Francis I (history extra staff). Marie Antoinette was engaged at the young age of 14 to her husband King Louis XV. Her wedding consisted of 5000 guests 57 carriages, 117 footmen, and 36 horses. Before she could marry she had to get her teeth straightened so she would look appealing to the public eye, but if she did not do so she would not be allowed
Maria Antonia Josepha Joanna, later known as Marie-Antoinette, was born on 02 November 1755. At 13 years of age, Marie was sent to France to begin her relationship with the Dauphin of France, Louis XVI. In 1770, at the age of 15, she and the Louis XVI were married in Vienna, then taking the throne in 1774. Marie-Antoinette was a young, beautiful, elegant, and graceful queen whose fashion influenced the women of France. She was very proud of where she originated, Hapsburg, and she was very proud of how she presented herself.
Marie Antoinette born in Vienna, Austria 1755 (History.com Staff). She was the 15th child of the Holy Roman Empire Francis the 1st and the powerful Habsburg Empress Maria Theresa (History.com Staff). She lived a fairly free childhood and received a typical education (Biography.com Editors).
In one version of the story, the queen (Marie Antoinette 's sister and the daughter of Empress Maria Teresa of Austria) is said to have been described by the king as having "common tastes," apparently a quality thought to explain her love of pizza, a dish of the people. It is, however, a measure of the confounding nature of pizza lore that in a variant of the story, it is the king who relishes pizza and the refined queen who does not understand his passion.