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Did Marie Antoinette really say 'Let them eat cake'? - Livescience.com
Apr 11, 2021 1 min, 49 secs

The quick answer to this question is a simple "no." Marie Antoinette, the last pre-revolutionary queen of France, did not say "Let them eat cake" when confronted with news that Parisian peasants were so desperately poor they couldn't afford bread.

Originally, Marie Antoinette was alleged to have said, "Qu'ils mangent de la brioche," or "Let them eat brioche." While this sweetened bread is more expensive than an average baguette, it isn't exactly the icing-laden, multi-tiered gateaux you might have imagined the queen had in mind?

"Marie Antoinette never uttered these words or anything else along these lines," said Denise Maior-Barron, an adjunct professor at Claremont Graduate University in California, whose research examines contemporary portrayals of Marie Antoinette's character.

"It did not come to be misattributed to Marie Antoinette during the 18th century, but during the Third French Republic starting in 1870, when a careful program of reconstructing the historical past took place," Maior-Barron told Live Science. .

In the 1870s, the republicans, who successfully dethroned Napoléon III after he conclusively lost a war against Prussia, were building on a longstanding campaign to undermine Marie Antoinette's legacy and reputation?

"The masterminds of the French Revolution destroyed the French monarchy by continually attacking, and eventually destroying, its most important symbols: the king and the queen of France," Maior-Barron said.

This century-long effort to tarnish Marie Antoinette wasn't just about securing the republican cause, however; it was also tinged with sexism — after all, her reputation seems to have taken far more of a beating than that her husband, who was actually in charge of France. ?

In the preamble to the French Revolution, Marie Antoinette was accused of wielding too much power over her husband, Gildea explained.

In light of this, it's easy to see how propagandists were motivated to engage in a character assassination of Marie Antoinette, and the rumor mill surrounding her name certainly flourished around the time of the first revolution while she was still alive.

"When these powers did invade France, Marie Antoinette was seen as a traitor," Gildea said. .

In the end, the Habsburgs failed to stop the revolution, Marie Antoinette was decapitated and the victors were left to write the history books

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