The glamorous Queen is often remembered for her bejeweled dresses, overzealous spending and her brutal beheading during the French Revolution, but little is thought of her life as a parent.
Marie Antoinette famously struggled to have children with her husband King Louis XVI of France, and the young couple did not consummate their marriage for several years, despite constant pressure from the palace, family and diplomats.
The Queen’s desire to produce an heir led her to adopt a child called Francois-Michel from the street. However once she gave birth to her first child – Marie-Thérèse – she lost interest in her adopted son, causing a fraught relationship between Francois-Michel and the royals that lasted the remainder of his life.
Louis Joseph was Marie Antoinette’s second biological child and first biological son – making him “the Dauphin” of France and heir to the French crown. Records remember him as a happy and intelligent child with weak health and a curved spine. He sadly died of TB at seven years old, much to his family’s heartbreak.
Second son, Louis – who became had an incredibly tragic end. In the eyes of French royalists, he became King Louis XVII on 21 January 1793, when his father was executed by the revolutionaires.
In July 1793, he was removed from his family and put into the care of an (according to royalist soureces) abusive cobbler where he was reportedly raped by prostitutes and beaten by jailers.
It is said that the young prince was forced to accuse his mother and aunt of sexual assault while in the care of the cobbler, with the allegations then used by the revolutionaries to sentence Marie Antoinette to death.
Louis XVII died at just 10 years old after suffering TB. The physician who looked after him removed and smuggled the young prince’s heart from his body, preserving it in a crystal urn which was passed around France until it was finally laid to rest in 2004.
Marie-Thérèse was the only heir to survive the French Revolution. She went on to marry her cousin in Austria before moving to Buckinghamshire, England, where she lived in exile and without children for years. She died of pneumonia aged 72.
When is Marie Antoinette on?
Marie Antoinette is on Thursdays at 9pm on BBC2, and on iPlayer.
Before the French Revolution she lost two children: the Dauphin of France Louis Joseph
Louis Joseph
Louis Joseph Xavier François (22 October 1781 – 4 June 1789) was Dauphin of France as the second child and first son of King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. As son of a king of France, he was a fils de France ("Child of France").
, who died of tuberculosis when he was seven years old, and Sophie, who didn't live to be one year old. What happened to Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette's children?
Nonetheless, she had four biological children with her notoriously weak husband King Louis XVI, before facing her execution in 1793. They were: Marie Thérèse Charlotte, born on December 9, 1778, Louis Joseph Xavier François, born in 1781, Louis XVII, born in March 1785, and Sophie Hélène Béatrix, born in July 1786.
There are no direct descendants of Marie-Antoinette living today. She did have a daughter who survived the French Revolution and lived in exile for much of her adult life. Her name was Marie-Therese Charlotte, Madame Royale. She married her cousin the Duc d'Angouleme in 1799 and suffered a miscarriage in 1813.
Now, author Evelyn Farr is bringing to light evidence that two of the queen's children were actually fathered by Count Axel von Fersen and not King Louis XVI. Having recently finished watching Making a Murderer on Netflix my first reaction to this story was - "What about the DNA testing!?"
She died in 1851, still in exile. Marie's second child, Louis Joseph, died at age 7 of tuberculosis. The third child, Louis Charles, died at age 10 while in prison from medical complications. Their final child, Sophie, died while still in infant.
Both of his sons died in childhood, before the Bourbon Restoration; his only child to reach adulthood, Marie Thérèse, was given over to the Austrians in exchange for French prisoners of war, eventually dying childless in 1851.
While there is no reigning emperor or king of France today, there are still descendants of the House of Bonaparte: the former imperial and royal European dynasty founded by Napoleon I in 1804, when he transformed the First French Republic into the First French Empire.
Cleopatra Selene is the only known surviving member of the Ptolemaic dynasty. Her brothers are not recorded in any further historical accounts and are presumed to have died, possibly from either illness or assassination.
Yes, Marie Antoinette is distantly related to Queen Elizabeth. Genealogists state that they are fourth cousins four times removed. The common ancestor they share is Eberhard III, Duke of Wurttemberg.
At the time of their marriage, Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI were not particularly close, and it took them some time to develop a closer relationship. However, they did eventually develop a close bond and were said to be devoted to each other.
According to a hypothesis worked by writers of the nineteenth century, including Victor Hugo, Marie-Thérèse would have been the mother of a black nun, Louise Marie Thérèse, known as the Mauresse de Moret. She claimed to be of royal blood and this woman received much honor from Louis XIV for a simple nun.
In 1770, Marie Antoinette married Louis-Auguste, and over the course of their marriage, Marie Antoinette became pregnant six times. Two pregnancies ended in miscarriages (1779 and 1783). She had two daughters (born in 1778 and 1786) and two sons (born in 1781 and 1785).
In 1778, after eight long years of marriage, she finally gave birth to her first child. Marie-Thérèse, known as “Madame Royale”, was soon followed by a Dauphin, Louis Joseph Xavier-François, born in 1781.
Nobu the dwarf was blamed and was later found dead in the fountain in front of the palace, implying he was the father and either killed to keep the secret or out of Louis' vengeance for cuckolding him under his own roof.
Although Marie Antoinette initially condescended to her husband, she eventually developed a genuine fondness for him. For his part, Louis was completely devoted to her and never took a mistress, exhibiting a restraint virtually unheard of in an 18th-century French king.
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