Marie Antoinette survives and becomes Queen of France

How likely is it that Marie escaped execution and avoided her husband's fate, sneaking out of France and back to Austria to call on support to take back France? Would she have legal authority? How likely was it?
 
How likely is it that Marie escaped execution and avoided her husband's fate, sneaking out of France and back to Austria to call on support to take back France? Would she have legal authority? How likely was it?
No one, if anything would make the revolutionary forces more fierce as they hated her a lot, unless he can smuggle his children too(and even among the rich burgeoise the kid was considered a bastard)
 
Anyone else?

Well there's the whole thing that she's UNLIKELY to be any sort of Ekaterina II. She comes back with Austrian support (from who? Leopold II wasn't really interested in helping her if it didn't benefit him/Austria and Franz II had never met her) she'll be seen as a virago and a puppet. Her son will be RIGHTFUL king of France, she wouldn't even be regent (amendments to the laws of France had changed it from the Dowager Queen to the senior prince du sang RESIDENT in France). So just WHAT reason would she have of leading an army to Paris?
 
Blame....dunno with an old poster we discussed how Little she was loved AND His whole affair with that swedish count damage a lot her and Louis XVI reputations

Fersen?
Doubtful.
Antoinette's rep was ruined by her spending, Affaire du Collière was a MASSIVE blow to the monarchy's reputation (even though I think Fraser wrote that Antoinette ACTUALLY spent less than Marie Leszczynska or the Mesdames les Tantes), her taking so long to give the kingdom an heir (SHE was blamed for that, NOT Louis XVI, where the fault ACTUALLY lay)..

A LOT of her unpopularity came a) from being Austrian (a traditional enemy of France); and b) her husband NOT having a mistress. As a result of the former, anything that went wrong in French politics was blamed on her influence, when in actual fact, she had zilch. And as a result of the latter Antoinette was on the receiving end of a LOT of the hate that the French normally aimed at their king's mistress.
 
She was not the monarch of France, she (like all French queens) was only the consort of her husband. She had no legitimacy to lead a counter-revolution herself, and was not popular either. If anything, she probably would damage support for her son's claim.
 
She was not the monarch of France, she (like all French queens) was only the consort of her husband. She had no legitimacy to lead a counter-revolution herself, and was not popular either. If anything, she probably would damage support for her son's claim.
Well you never know
 
How likely is it that Marie escaped execution and avoided her husband's fate, sneaking out of France and back to Austria to call on support to take back France? Would she have legal authority? How likely was it?

She would be hated. You know how people attach that apocryphal quote 'Let them eat cake' to her? Well, she didn't say it, but it pretty much sums up her mood. To the French people, all she cared about was living a luxurious lifestyle. She spent so much money on her lifestyle that among the regular people, they called her 'Madame Deficit'. Even if she wasn't responsible for the nation's financial woes, she certainly didn't help matters when she played a role in the dismissal of two reformist financial ministers, because she was worried if they took her expenses into her account, the court's expenses, as a whole, would balloon above the official 7% of the state budget. She also played a part in King Louis being so resistant to listen to the demands of the National Assembly.

Of course, there were a lot of bogus accusations levelled against her, such as being a lesbian, bathing in blood and even of having an affair with Marquis de Lafayette (a man she hated), but bogus or not, the French people hated her because to them, she was one of the factors that caused France's economic collapse.

So, yeah. Putting her on the throne to replace her husband would be a terrible idea.
 
Well you never know

Uh, yeah we do...unlike her predecessor consorts, Antoinette didn't even have a CORONATION as consort. They cited the "lack of funds" but I suspect it was both because she was Austrian AND she hadn't given Louis a child yet. So she wouldn't have even had THAT figleaf of legitimacy.
 
Even if she wasn't responsible for the nation's financial woes, she certainly didn't help matters when she played a role in the dismissal of two reformist financial ministers, because she was worried if they took her expenses into her account

Actually this is a misconception. The comtesse de Provence and the comte d'Artois' debts were FAR in excess to hers. Louis XVI had to settle them several times during his reign.

In comparison to Antoinette's L'Hameau at Versailles, the comtesse de Provence's version had windmilld and everything; while the princesse de Condé's at Chantilly was even MORE extravagant than THAT IIRC.

Antoinette's spending was excessive, yes. But she suffers a lot from being put in the same basket to her predecessor (Madame du Barry) and successor (Josèphine de Beauharnais). Du Barry's DOGS walked around with DIAMOND collars, Josèphine's extravagance was likewise nothing to be sneezed at (she had a bigger wardrobe than Antoinette IIRC).
 

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Actually this is a misconception. The comtesse de Provence and the comte d'Artois' debts were FAR in excess to hers. Louis XVI had to settle them several times during his reign.

In comparison to Antoinette's L'Hameau at Versailles, the comtesse de Provence's version had windmilld and everything; while the princesse de Condé's at Chantilly was even MORE extravagant than THAT IIRC.

Antoinette's spending was excessive, yes. But she suffers a lot from being put in the same basket to her predecessor (Madame du Barry) and successor (Josèphine de Beauharnais). Du Barry's DOGS walked around with DIAMOND collars, Josèphine's extravagance was likewise nothing to be sneezed at (she had a bigger wardrobe than Antoinette IIRC).
Just goes to show that people are really gullible aha
 
Always wonder whether a more flexible, creative Leopold II could have negotiated an orderly exile of the Royal family as part of a renewal of the 1756 alliance with France.

France takes the Austrian Netherlands. Austria takes Venetia and Dalmatia. Royal family in exile—I think they would have preferred to go to Rome. I picture a toxic little court there full of emigres. But without Austria as a nemesis, France settles in as a conservative republic and perhaps no revolutionary wars ensue?
 
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She would be hated. You know how people attach that apocryphal quote 'Let them eat cake' to her? Well, she didn't say it, but it pretty much sums up her mood. To the French people, all she cared about was living a luxurious lifestyle. She spent so much money on her lifestyle that among the regular people, they called her 'Madame Deficit'. Even if she wasn't responsible for the nation's financial woes, she certainly didn't help matters when she played a role in the dismissal of two reformist financial ministers, because she was worried if they took her expenses into her account, the court's expenses, as a whole, would balloon above the official 7% of the state budget. She also played a part in King Louis being so resistant to listen to the demands of the National Assembly.
Actually this is a misconception. The comtesse de Provence and the comte d'Artois' debts were FAR in excess to hers. Louis XVI had to settle them several times during his reign.

In comparison to Antoinette's L'Hameau at Versailles, the comtesse de Provence's version had windmilld and everything; while the princesse de Condé's at Chantilly was even MORE extravagant than THAT IIRC.

Antoinette's spending was excessive, yes. But she suffers a lot from being put in the same basket to her predecessor (Madame du Barry) and successor (Josèphine de Beauharnais). Du Barry's DOGS walked around with DIAMOND collars, Josèphine's extravagance was likewise nothing to be sneezed at (she had a bigger wardrobe than Antoinette IIRC).
Plus more than one minister of Finance encouraged Marie Antoinette’s spending in clothing and other French products as good for the national economy so her dismissing the ministers of finance for that concerns sound pretty unlikely. And Marie Antoinette has zero fault in the Affaire du Collière unlike the Cardinal of Rohan and the King...
 
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