First Impressions

Marie Antoinette's first encounter with French soil proper came at Strasbourg, where she was greeted with elaborate festivities. The city had spent enormous sums on decorations, triumphal arches, and public entertainments. Local guilds competed to create the most impressive displays, while the city fathers commissioned allegorical performances celebrating the union of Austria and France.

The young dauphine made a favorable impression on the crowds. Contemporary accounts describe her graceful bearing, her attempts to speak French (with a still-noticeable German accent), and her obvious pleasure at the warm reception. The Bishop of Strasbourg, Cardinal Louis de Rohan, delivered a flowery welcome address that would later prove ironic given his role in the Diamond Necklace Affair that would help destroy her reputation.

Yet beneath the surface celebration lay tensions. Alsace had only been French for a century, and many residents still felt more German than French. Some viewed Marie Antoinette not as a foreign princess becoming French but as a German princess joining a German population under French rule. Anonymous pamphlets circulated questioning whether France needed another foreign queen after the disasters associated with previous Austrian and Spanish consorts.

The journey from Strasbourg to Compiègne, where she would meet Louis-Auguste, took several days. At each stop, Marie Antoinette encountered the vast diversity of France—prosperous merchants in some towns, obvious poverty in others. Her controllers carefully managed these encounters, ensuring she saw mostly the positive aspects of her new kingdom. Yet observant members of her retinue, like the Abbé de Vermond, noted her shock at the beggars who clustered around her carriage despite efforts to keep them away.