Queen mothers, Queen daughters: education, politics and correspondence in the courts of the eighteenth century

Abstract

The princesses and the queens consisted of restricted group of women, whose protagonism in the political and cultural events of the past is considered more and more interesting. Hence, the importance of knowing their education and, within, the mark of mothers over the daughters. Women of different generations who demonstrate in their correspondence the outlines across has been molded the function of reigning. Isabel Farnesio’s relationship with her daughters and daughter-in-law or Maria Luisa of Parma with hers, exemplify well the conscious attempt of turning them not so much into exemplary consorts, but into queens capable of taking care of her family interests and of helping and, even, of replacing his royal spouses in the task of government. A relation founded through the affection, which allows to verification through the style of the letters, how the political complexity is expressed within the margins of the privacy. The problem was that, at the end of the 18th century, princesses and infantas did not want or could not pursue the model of their predecessors, so that, before the thrones fell the thrones, not only their reputation, but their position within the monarchy was weakened.