Why is Marie Antoinette so hated?

 The Paris Olympics, which were full of talk and trouble, are now over. We remember them as having good results, but I think the games themselves were Olympics with endless issues. Especially the bizarreness of the opening and closing ceremonies.... They surpassed the Pyeongchang Olympics. ^^. Among them, I was very shocked to see the performance of Marie Antoinette with her head cut off. Let's find out why the French hate Marie Antoinette so much.

 

Scenes from the controversial Paris Olympics opening ceremony performance (Photo: YouTube)

 

The Shaking European Society

 It is necessary to first understand that Europe in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Times was a society of nobles who were in harmony with Christianity and Greco-Roman culture, unlike the Eastern world of the Chinese character cultural sphere, which consisted of nations, dynasties, and god-like kings and the people who had to obey them absolutely. The concept of a king is also a bit different from the East, as it feels like a representative elected from among the nobles and recognized by the church. (Of course, they have their own strong power...but it is completely different from the East.) In particular, in the case of the Habsburgs, who share the same history as the Holy Roman Empire, they exerted influence throughout Europe through marriage alliances between relatives, so it is better to understand that European countries were in a situation where distantly related kings ruled over their respective regions. That means that there were fewer boundaries between countries and the sense of alienation between kings. Therefore, it is easy to understand things like the King of France participating in the War of Succession to the British throne and the King of Spain targeting the Netherlands from this perspective.

 It is very different from the historical perception of our people, who have clear boundaries between nations and countries. The marriage relationships between princes of a certain country and daughters of nobles of a certain city that we often see in fairy tales are inherited from these historical and cultural characteristics, so we can say that the sense of national belonging and cohesion that we think of in the Eastern world is quite different. In the East, it is the duty of subjects and citizens to fight for their country and king, but in the West, the concept of fighting together under nobles who have made a contract(?) to protect their families is important. So, it is said that the Western characteristic is to negotiate and stop fighting when it seems like they will lose.

 

 As European society moved into the modern era, the concept of nationalism and statism began to center around royal authority, and it is interpreted that this began with Le Roi Soleil Louis XIV. It is called the era of absolute monarchy. Simply put, it is the concept that nobles and commoners formed a country and grew in power under a strong royal authority.

 

 In fact, the most famous world event right before his appearance, which can be said to have been the trigger for him to feel the need for this absolute monarchy, was the Thirty Years' War. It was a huge war in which the Catholic and Protestant forces fought fiercely in the territory of the Holy Roman Empire, which is now Germany. It is said that this war devastated Germany and caused extreme experiences for the people.

 

 On the surface, it was a religious war between Protestants and Catholics, but in reality, it was a war in which the noble forces of each region used mercenaries to show off their power in Germany, and the mercenaries hired from all over Europe for this war game of nobles traveled around Germany for 30 years, fighting only for money. During this process, each city in Germany became a place of plunder by mercenaries and was horribly destroyed, and the wealthy noble families of Europe gradually faced financial pressure as they had to provide military funds to the mercenaries.

 

 This miserable war ended with the absurd Peace of Westphalia, which was a "return to the pre-war state," and at a time when people were reflecting that they should never do such a stupid thing again, the new person who appeared was Louis XIV. He had the ambition to stabilize the country with a strong royal authority and stabilize the world with that power. At the same time, Germany had been devastated by the Thirty Years' War, and France was the most populous country in Europe, so it was not difficult for the country to grow quickly and strongly. Perhaps this period of prosperity was a time when the French could be proud of being the most successful in Europe.

 

 

The Fall of Wealthy France

 After Louis XIV, his son Louis XV inherited his father's glory and ruled a powerful country. However, Louis XV did not seem to be a very wise monarch. It is said that he was born with many blessings and had a strong tendency to be spoiled and was like a fool who did not know the fears of the world.

 At that time, a new and powerful country called Prussia was born in the German region and was preparing to challenge Austria, the Habsburg suzerain, for hegemony by using its increased power. Frederick II clearly established the concept of "line infantry" and trained new tactics and well-equipped infantry tactics to build a powerful force. He was eagerly eyeing the opportunity to take over the Silesia region that was under Austria's control to make Prussia even more powerful.

 At that time, in Austria, there was a movement to have Maria Theresa take over the throne because there was no son to succeed Charles VI after his death. However, because women could not inherit the throne, people of mixed blood with the Habsburgs all over Europe were all claiming that they would be the king, causing chaos. Eventually, Maria Theresa made her husband Francis I the king through marriage and exercised real power, but Frederick of Prussia thought this was a good excuse and took advantage of it to start the War of the Austrian Succession, once again plunging Europe into the vortex of war. The war was centered around Prussia and Austria, but the surrounding countries joined in, expanding the scope of the war and eventually leading to the Seven Years' War. At this time, all the nobles in Europe who were being forced to give up participated in this war, calculating each other's accounts, so of course it was impossible for the enthusiastic Louis XV not to join in! He led the elite French troops to start a war against Austria, but he always lost.

 He also drove his own people into war, but he himself lost his soul at parties with noble ladies, and caused various scandals... He was a king with many problems. The war at the time required enormous war funds, and no matter how strong France's finances were, it was on the verge of bankruptcy, but Louis XV was obsessed with women and parties, further ruining the country's finances.


 It's really surprising that this irresponsible and incompetent king was a very lucky person, as he had a loving prostitute, spent all his money, and ended his life comfortably, passing on the things he had done to his son, Louis XVI.

 

Marie Antoinette, who resembled her mother Maria Theresa and was as beautiful as white jade (Image by Pascal from Pixabay)

 

Political marriage and a tragic ending

 The war was over, and France and Austria made peace. The symbol and ambassador of that peace was Marie Antoinette. Marie was Maria Theresa's beloved daughter. She was sent to Louis XVI of France to form a marriage alliance. Marie Antoinette, a girl with many dreams and no knowledge of anything, set foot on French soil for the first time and met her husband, Louis XVI. However, to the French, Marie was nothing more than a hated woman from an enemy country. They thought that their glorious era had been taken away when they participated in the war with Austria, and they blamed Austria for killing their soldiers rather than their own king who had done it. In the meantime, Marie Antoinette, who represented Austria, was a perfect target for the French people's abuse. Using the emotions of the people to incite them and gain political windfalls is a very familiar strategy to us.

 At that time, Madame Bovary, who was the mistress of Louis XV, was in a situation where she could not help but worry about losing power when the regime was transferred to Louis XVI. It is said that the best way to protect her lust for power was to put Marie Antoinette in a difficult situation for political gain. Bovary became close to Marie Antoinette and began speculating that would damage her image, and also created various rumors and fake news to gossip the public. As a result, Marie gradually became more isolated from speculation and rumors, and since Marie had never experienced the bitterness of this world, she did not know how to deal with it and just took it helplessly. The famous saying, “If there is no bread, why don’t you eat cake?” is said to have originated from this process. It seems that the human nature of exploiting those who show weakness is no different in the East or the West. In the end, due to Louis XV's excessive foreign wars and extravagance (of course, Louis XVI also had some indecisive and wrong policies...), the lives of the noble families became difficult due to the ruined finances, and the lives of the common people and the lower classes were needless to say, and the anger that had built up to an extreme created even greater anger, reaching the point where they said, "Just catch me once!" In the midst of all this, it would have been perfect to use Marie Antoinette as a fuse to ignite their accumulated anger, and Paris began to fall into chaos due to the popular agitation and fake news of the forces leading the revolution.

 

 In this cornered situation, Louis XVI and Marie attempted to escape to Austria, but failed, which became the decisive factor in their arrest and imprisonment, and soon after, Louis XVI was executed by the guillotine, and a few months later, Marie Antoinette also ended her life by the guillotine. Of course, the French Revolution is evaluated as a valuable historical turning point that created a new people's history, but just as history is tailored to suit the taste of the victors, it is true that these causal relationships were forgotten and only the achievements of the revolution were emphasized. It was bitter to watch that even the performance mocking Marie Antoinette's beheading at the 2024 Paris Olympics was due to some political intention and incorrect historical awareness.


 Finally, I told you the story of Marie, who became a miserable victim in the whirlwind of history. Let's meet again with another interesting story~