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lan-wangjis-autism · 1 year

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Have I been pronouncing Fleur-de-Lis wrong this whole time 😭 What a knock off french revolution interested blogger I am

#edit: (talking about adelaide-of-versailles my frerev/prefrerev blog)

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archduchessofnowhere · 1 year

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Sorry to bother you with this, since you, well, outright said you hate that discourse, but what are some of those dumb Marie Antoinette takes on Twitter? So that we can point and laugh.

Again, sorry for bothering you with this, and yes, yes, yes, million times yes to Maria Carolina being the best daughter of Maria Theresia! I am literally crying tears of joy, just the fact that I found a second person who thinks this...

Honestly the sad truth is that the only thing an average Twitter user, even a pop history fan, knows about the Habsburgs is the whole inbreeding thing. I know I've already said this to you specifically, but I am TIRED of this discourse, can you please learn one other fact about the family that ruled significant chunk of Europe for hundreds of years and shaped its destiny, for better or for worse?! Jesus.

It's not a bother at all! I believe it all started with this tweet that quickly went viral in history-related circles:

This is not an insane take and I kinda get where OP was coming from, but honestly it also feels... unnecessary? Marie Antoinette isn't a particularly hated person, historical revisionism around her has been since what, the Restoration? and only in the last twenty years most of the MA media that came out is highly sympathetic towards her. People like Marie Antoinette!

But this tweet sparked a series of responses and the more you scroll through those takes the worst they get lol. You have on one side the fervent anti-MA that keep repeating myths that have been busted like twenty years ago: "she dressed up to play peasant to mock the poor", "she kidnapped children"; I even read someone who actually thought the incest charge was real WHAT are you getting your info from Frerev pamphlets??? I'm not an Antoinette enthusiast but the spread of false information annoys me no matter the subject. And then you have the fervent pro-MA that think she was a feminist icon who did nothing wrong ever and will not tolerate any criticism towards her. That she and her husband called the enemies' army to invade France to keep themselves in power is no big deal, apparently. I think some of the worst takes from this crowd were from people that were just repeating the claims that N*ancy G*ldstone did in her MA book (one went along the lines of "Louis was autistic and that doom them" [this is one of G*ldstone's claims, impossible to know for certain since Louis XVI has been dead for over two hundred years and we can't posthumously diagnose him, also I want to believe that OP didn't do it on purpose but the implication that being autistic is something that "dooms" you is very gross. And even if Louis was autistic what has to do with his policies as a monarch?]) .

I didn't keep reading them because I got bored, to be honest. No one has anything new to say, is always the same discussions, no one brings any nuances. My biggest problem with MA takes is that they're all short sighted, even this one that mentions her being married at a young age and the xenophobia she suffered. Was this something unusual for other consorts? What was the role of the queen in France? Was MA different to her predecessors, and if she was, then how? What was happening in France during the 1780s? How did the monarchs react to the economical crisis and political unrest? What was the role of propaganda in all this? MA wasn't the only Habsburg archduchess married to a Bourbon monarch, so what was the difference between her and her sisters' queenship (well Maria Amalia wasn't a queen but you get what I mean)? Without the full picture she's just a stereotype to adjust to the narrative you like the most.

Maria Carolina truthers know she's the most interesting daughter and the one there should be hundreds of books and movies about, but the general audiences haven't seen the light yet.

What bothers me the most about the inbreeding jokes is that the Habsburgs were not an outliner: they followed the rule. That family tree everyone loves to post is just how your average royal family tree looked like. The Bourbons were marrying their nieces well into the 19th century (really they should be the "European incest dynasty everyone bullies"). The way the Habsburgs shaped the history of Central Europe and the Americas is fascinating! No other dynasty lasted that long and had such impact. I'm still only on the top of the iceberg on learning about them, and it genuinely surprise me how many people is just "nah they seem boring".

#btw twitter sucks every time i login i immediately regret it #queen marie antoinette of france #house of habsburg #asks

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general-george-washington · 1 year

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The French revolution teacher at my uni has come back this semester and she's teaching a class on frerev next semester but I'll be done by then. Hell

#i have her rn for ah 1960's america #thats her fields of study. french revolution and cultural movements in the mid 1900 in the US #i wanted to take a french revolution class so badly. only got it in my modern violence class.

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thesecretesthistory · 4 years

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