Insofar as one can simplify it purely in terms of her four grandparents, Marie Antoinette had the blood of the Bourbons-the Orleans branch-and of Lorraine on her father's side. This was an age of multiple intermarriage where royal houses were concerned. A seemingly small point of French etiquette-small at least to outsiders-was to be of considerable significance in the future of Francis Stephen's daughter. This ambiguous status was one from which the foreign princes ever sought to escape, while those of superior birth in French courtly terms sought to hold them down.
Thus Marie Antoinette was brought up to think of herself as "de Lorraine" as well as "d'Autriche et de Hongrie." In the meantime Lorraine had become a foreign principality attached to France, so that princes of Lorraine who made their lives in France had the status of "foreign princes" only and were not accorded the respect due to foreign royalties nor that due to French dukes.
This strong-minded woman was so devoted to her native Lorraine that she once said she was prepared to travel there barefoot. Princess Charlotte fired over 9000 shots, nearly as many as the Emperor. In the year of Marie Antoinette's birth, a party of twenty-three, three of them ladies, killed nearly 50,000 head of game and wild deer. She shared her brother's taste for shooting parties, in which she personally participated. Then there was Francis Stephen's attachment to his unmarried sister Princess Charlotte, Abbess of Remiremont, who was a frequent visitor. The marriage of Maria Teresa's sister Marianna to Francis Stephen's younger brother Charles of Lorraine strengthened these ties Marianna's early death left Maria Teresa with a sentimental devotion to her widower.
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