#theresia cabbarus

[nesiacha]

In defense for Marie Antoinette

A long time ago following a passionate debate and good reblogs that you can easily find on Tumblr (if everyone agrees I will put the link), I had fun defending Marie Antoinette (although a fervent sympathizer about the Montagnards).As in two weeks it will be the defense of Manon Roland, I will put this ability to defend to the test by publishing what I had already written about the former queen of France. Here we go:

The problem with Marie Antoinette is that her education was often neglected, and her mother, the Great Marie Thérèse, an excellent politician, instilled in her very conservative ideas, not to mention the fact that she wanted her daughter to become a spy but without the great talent political of her mother. This will be one of the reasons why it will be a great problem when she arrives at the Court.

She won't have the necessary mental strength to face the heaviness of the protocol, and although she caused major problems initially in terms of expenditure, her frankness, unsuitable for a dauphine then a queen, and her frivolity don't help. In addition to the expenses she incurs to please her friends (notably Polignac), wanting to forget the pressure her mother puts on her, despite Louis being a good husband to her, with no children, which is a source of gossip, she decides to increasingly take refuge in Trianon, which again leads to excessive spending, not to mention new clothes. But it's important to note that once she had children, she behaved much less frivolously, more reasonably, less extravagantly, but refused to reintegrate Versailles, which she deemed as heavy and hypocritical (rightly so, but as her mother said, with privileges come duties; if she had made a concession on this side, perhaps she could have obtained less absurd protocol).

Once she had children with her husband Louis XVI, they did everything to ensure that their offspring did not have a high opinion of themselves. Just look at the fact that she wanted her children to dress equally to some of the household children and in her letters indicates that she does not want her daughter to be as arrogant as her aunts. She even tells them that since there are more and more poor people in France, they won't have gifts at a certain period. So she's not a snobbish woman.

Contrary to popular belief, Louis XVI is never influenced by his wife; in fact, she herself knows how to stay in her place as a queen consort and simply prefers to organize certain festivities. But her excessive frankness, rejection of her duties, frivolity in expenditure, and the fact that she sometimes openly shows disdain, for example, for Turgot (one of the few good financial controllers of Louis XVI) will make her the object of all vices in France and a scapegoat for all the decisions of the old Regime.

Do you know who agrees on this point? The revolutionary Saint Just himself in his writings in 1792, who immediately grasped the personality of the Queen in these terms: "Rather deceived than deceitful, rather light than perjured, entirely devoted to pleasure, she seemed to reign not in France but at Trianon."

Moreover, Joséphine de Beauharnais, who was a hundred times more spendthrift and frivolous than her, was much more loved because she took care of her image unlike Marie Antoinette. Perhaps because Marie Antoinette was more frank than her .

In the end, Marie Antoinette stole less from the coffers, so to speak, because her husband wouldn't have let her, and she herself wouldn't have wanted to. Theresia Cabarrus, who profited well from Tallien's scam, was seen as wonderful because she took care of her image. Furthermore, Marie Antoinette clearly displayed her allegiance and stuck to it until the end (although this allegiance was outdated, her mother's conservative ideas about absolute monarchy), faithful to the people she loved (she insisted on sheltering her friends, but Lamballe returned despite the queen's pleas not to do so to support her, faithful to her husband, despite the arranged marriage, because even though she insisted they leave, she didn't want to leave him alone), isn't a friend of the good day only, compared to Cabarrus, who claimed to be imbued with Enlightenment ideas, said she didn't like bloodshed, but in the end, went from one bloody person to another not out of survival (as she liked to say) but out of wealth before marrying a royalist. Yet Theresia and Beauharnais (who took part in the serious scandal during the creation of the Bank of France as a shareholder) did not receive as much criticism.

Of course, we can also understand Marie Antoinette's criticism of Necker, a proud man who is content to borrow and pretend to be more competent than he really is and stabs people in the back (he criticized Turgot but if Turgot hadn't played the "villain," Necker wouldn't have been able to borrow a penny to cover his good reputation not to mention his weather vane attitude and his false attitude as a friend of the people that Marat denounced ), although I don't understand the contempt she had for Turgot.

For her betrayal towards France, I agree with all of you , it's inexcusable, I won't go back on that. What Louis XVI did (primarily him because he was never influenced by his wife, but she also has some responsibility in this regard) is involuntary mass homicide against the French people for the return of absolute monarchy. The problem is that at that time we didn't have the necessary evidence to condemn her (although there was legitim suspicion of the truth), it was a parody and even Saint Just seemed to oppose this execution by telling Robespierre that "this act (the execution) would not benefit national sovereignty." Unfortunately, the person who said this in one of the forums, however, very educated, lost the citation from this book, so let's go cautiously, especially since if the letters had been found, I think Saint Just would have been in favor of the execution of Marie Antoinette. But as mentioned above, at least Antoinette did not betray any ideals, she was clear about that unlike Cabbarus who claimed that she rejected Tallien because of the blood in his hand but then go to Barras, said that she is attired by « les idées lumières » and go to wedding a monarchist, etc., who do not receive as much criticism. But I also understand the hatred she received from Jacques Roux, from a Momoro, and from so many others who never had luxury and found her expenses and behavior legitimately scandalous. But like everyone else outraged and shocked by the behavior of Hébert (and Pache, Chaumette, and Jacques Louis David should not be forgotten even though I like Pache and I find Chaumette unfairly maligned by their best moments it’s was not their best moments and should have died of shame for using such a method, as for Hébert and even to a lesser extent Jacques Louis David, let's not even talk about them).

At least Marie Antoinette unlike other didn’t betrayals the ideas of the revolution unlike some who claimed themself child of the revolution and then betray the revolutionnaries.

If we want to fight against the dishonest people who have blamed everything on people like Saint Just, Robespierre, Couthon, Billaud Varennes (isn't Fouché and Turreau?) we must also do the same thing even for people who are against the revolution even if I agree that the martyrdom of the upper class is tiring and that making Marie Antoinette a pure feminist and innocent icon is just as wrong (but I am here to defend her in this post).

P.S.: I know that Theresia and Joséphine did not harm people unlike their husbands and lovers at least not as much; I do not want to absolve Napoleon, Barras, Tallien; they did not need these women to do what they are reproached for, but to better situate them in relation to Marie Antoinette.

[nesiacha]

I had a dream last night that I was a servant for Theresia Cabbarus and Ouvrard and that I glorified them for free without anything in return. Does anyone have an explanation for the origin of this nightmare? P.S: I reassure you that it is not the fact that Theresia Cabbarus had lovers or children from different fathers that makes me not like this character at all (which Bonaparte hypocritically reproached her for). After all, I like Sophie Momoro, she married twice (once a widow and then divorced from Jacques Marie Botot, even if I think that the wrongs were shared in this divorce, it is not the evil Jacques Marie Botot, or the evil Sophie) took a lover and had another child from him.