Marie Antoinette was made a scapegoat during the years leading up to the French Revolution. Her enemies used her wastefulness and her unearned reputation for infidelity to whip up the masses against the monarchy. She was made a symbol of hatred to all of France. Sadly for this young queen she was not guilty of most of what she was accused of, including saying, “Let them eat cake.?

Marie Antoinette was born November2, 1755 in Vienna, Austria. She was the youngest and most beautiful daughter of Maria Theresa, Archduchess of Austria and queen of Hungary and Bohemia, and Holy Roman emperor Francis I. Archduchess Marie grew up in the highly moral environment of her mother’s court. Her education was left la

The discontent of the French people had reached a boiling point, and the “foreign?queen became the focal point of their anger. The French people hated her for her Austrian blood and her formerly extravagant behavior. Marie Antoinette was called Madame Deficit and blamed her for the country’s financial problems. “Cartoonist portrayed them as gorging themselves at a sumptuous banquet while all around them their pinched-faced subjects held their empty stomachs and gazed hungrily at the food.? Although the French Revolution began because of economic, political, and social troubles for the masses, Marie Antoinette became the focus of the people’s hatred, and has received a lot of the blame for the Revolution.

Austria and France had been at war with each other many times. Having settled their differences, Marie’s mother arranged for her marriage to the crown prince of France. Marie was only 15 years old, and Louis was only 16. The marriage between Louis XIV and Marie was really an arranged marriage between the two countries, which formed the Franco- Austrian alliance. Four years after their marriage the old King of France died. The new king and queen of France were quoted as saying, “Protect us, Lord, for we reign too young.?

Some topics in this essay:
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