There is so much written about Marie Antoinette, much of it contradictory, that I just could not squeeze her story down into a single episode, not even with liberal use of the backspace button. So this is the first of three episodes on a woman who many hoped would be the last queen of France. In this episode:
she is born in Vienna, though we don't know much about her childhood
she wins (or loses) the dice roll the determines who marries who between Versailles and Vienna
a hasty education focuses more on her appearance than her knowledge
the court of Versailles is dominated by petty social interactions
and her husband, bless him, has problems of his own.
Visit the website (herhalfofhistory.com) for sources, transcripts, and pictures.
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