Biography
Maria Luisa of Parma was born in Parma, Italy. Her parents had been the Duke and Duchess of Parma since 1749 when the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748) gave the Bourbons the Duchy; Austria had previously owned the Duchy. She was the favourite child of her mother, who tried to engage her to the Duke of Bourgogne, heir to the French throne. However, the young Duke died in 1761, so in 1762 Maria Luisa became engaged to the Prince of Asturias (heir to the throne), Charles, later King Charles IV of Spain, whom she married on 4 September 1765 in La Granja Palace.
As there was no Queen in Spain at that time, Maria Luisa became the first lady of the court from the beginning. Her husband was the son and heir of the widowed Charles III of Spain, previously Duke of Parma and King of Naples and Sicily. His wife, Maria Amalia of Saxony (aunt of the Duke of Burgundy) had died in 1760 having been Queen of Spain for just a year.
The famous Spanish artist Goya painted several of her portraits. She was often described by contemporaries as an ugly (however, pretty in her youth), vicious, and coarse woman who thoroughly dominated the king. She had well-known rivalries with the Duchess of Alba, the Duchess of Osuna and her sister-in-law, Maria Carolina, Queen of Naples. Her beauty was damaged by her many childbirths - among other things, she lost her teeth - but she made many efforts to look pretty and dress elegantly; she had beautiful arms and she often wore short-sleeved dresses to expose them.
Maria Luisa dominated her husband and was believed to have had many love affairs, but there is no evidence that Maria Luisa had any lovers. Gossip pointed out Manuel de Godoy, her husband's Prime Minister, was her long-time lover. She was unpopular during her reign and has also long had a bad reputation in history, mainly because of her alleged love affairs and her support of pro-French policies that eventually weren't good for Spain. In 1792, the Order of Queen Maria Luisa was founded on her suggestion, an order which was given only to women.
Maria Luisa didn't get along with her daughter-in-law Princess Maria Antonia of Naples and Sicily, because the princess tried to undermine her power, guided by her mother, Maria Carolina. After several miscarriages, Maria Antonia died from tuberculosis, an illness she had suffered for several years. According to the memoirs of the Duchess of Abrantes, it was rumored that she was poisoned by Maria Luisa, although there is actually no evidence that Maria Antonia was poisoned.
Due to pressure from Napoleon, her husband abdicated the throne of Spain in 1808, and together with Maria Luisa and Godoy spent the rest of his life in exile. When Napoleon's army invaded the country, several pamphlets blamed her for that. Maria Luisa spent some years in France and then in Rome, Italy. Both Maria Luisa and her husband died in Italy in early 1819.
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