Born an archduchess of Austria, Marie
Antoinette was the fifteenth child of Holy Roman Emperor Francis I and Empress Maria
Theresa. She married the French dauphin, Louis, grandson of Louis XV of France,
in 1770 and became Queen when he ascended the throne in 1774 as Louis XVI
She was at first welcomed in
France but her frivolity contrasted with the withdrawn personality of her
husband and her extravagant lifestyle led to growing resentment by the French
people who were suspicious of her ties to Austria and her influence on the
King.
Add to this, throughout the late
1780’s France was struggling with economic, political and social upheaval and
Paris was besieged with riots which culminated in the storming of the Bastille
on 14 July 1789.
The escape of the royal couple
from Paris was stopped at Varennes on October 21, 1791. Imprisoned with the
king, Marie Antoinette continued to plot, hoping her brother, the Holy Roman
Emperor Leopold II would intervene to end the revolution and free the royal
family.
Charged with treason, Louis was
executed on 21 January 1793, at the age of thirty-eight and Marie Antoinette
was put on trial charged with aiding the enemy and inciting civil war. She was
declared guilty of treason in the early morning of 16 October, after two days
of proceedings and driven through Paris in an open cart, wearing a simple white
dress. At 12:15 p.m., she was beheaded at the Place de la Révolution
(present-day Place de la Concorde). Her last words were "Pardon me sir, I
meant not to do it", to Henri Sanson the executioner, whose foot she had
accidentally stepped on after climbing the scaffold. Her body was thrown into
an unmarked grave in the Madeleine cemetery, rue d'Anjou.
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