In the winter of 1807, as Napoleon’s army swept through Portugal, the royal court fled across the Atlantic to Brazil. For the Portuguese monarchy, it was a humiliating retreat. But for one ambitious princess, it was the opportunity of a lifetime. Described as a monster by her critics, mocked for her appearance, and feared for her relentless ambition, Carlota Joaquina earned a reputation as one of the most notorious and hated queens in European history.
Born in Spain on April 25, 1775, Carlota was the eldest surviving daughter of the future King Charles IV of Spain, who took the throne in 1788. She had an older brother named Carlos who died before her birth, and her mother, Maria Luisa of Parma, was still very young when Carlota was born. The following years brought a series of family tragedies, as several of her younger brothers diedin infancy. This created fears about the succession and meant Carlota was in the line of succession for much of her childhood.
Finally, a healthy son named Ferdinand was born in 1784 when Carlota was nine years old. Her early awareness of her place in the line of succession likely awakened her desirefor power, a trait that would define her later life. Carlota received a strict Catholic education, focused on subjects deemed appropriate fora royal woman, including history, geography, languages,drawing, sewing, and writing. She became exceptionally educated and intelligent, though this did little to temper her famously spirited and rebellious personality.
Behind the palace walls, however, family life was far from stable. Carlota’s mother dominated the royal court, and rumors circulated about her affair with the head of the Spanish government, Manuel Godoy. This made Maria Luisa an outcast in Spanish society, and some of Carlota’s later bad reputation stemmed in part from her association with her mother. Spain had steadily declined asa great power since the mid-17th century, but it still clung toa vast colonial empire in the Americas, stretching from California and Cuba south to Chile and Argentina.
Even after Ferdinand’s birth, Carlota retained significant status asthe eldest daughter ofthe future king of Spain, making her one ofthe most valuable royal brides in Europe. In 1785, at just ten years old, she was married off, shockingly young even by18th-century standards. Negotiations between Spanish and Portuguese governments for Carlota to marry Dom João, the second in line to the Portuguese throne, had been underway since the late 1770s. João’s parents, who were uncle and niece, had taken the throne as co-rulers of Portugal, King Pedro III and Queen Maria I, in 1777.
While Pedro died in 1786, Maria lived until 1816, and Carlota’s life was thus shaped significantlyby her relationship with her mother-in-law, the first queen to rule Portugal inher own right. The marriage contract was signedin 1785, and a proxy wedding ceremony was held that May, weeks after she turned ten;ão was then 18 years old. Due to Carlota’s youth, it was agreed the marriage would not be consummated until1790, when she was considered old enough to bear children. Just days after the proxy wedding, however,the ten-year-old princess was sent to Lisbon witha Spanish entourage, leaving her family behind years beforethe marriage would truly begin.
She was therefore present atthe Portuguese court when the kingdom’s politics shiftedin1788. On September 11 of that year, her brother-in-law, Dom José, heir to the throne, died of smallpox, making Carlota’s husband the new heir. Moreover, Queen Maria had suffered from depression formost of her later life, being formally declared insanein1792. This meant João was expected to take on the role of regent and de facto ruler from the 1790sunward, making Carlota akin toan unofficial queen consort from an early age.
Recognizing their elevated status, João and Carlota received the titles of Prince and Princess of Brazil. During the 1790s and early 1800s, as Carlota became more prominent atthe Portuguese court, she became increasingly the target of mockery and hatred among court circles and wider Portuguese society. She was seen asa power-hungry foreigner who did not understand the conservative court culture around her. Raised inthe more opulent Spanish court, she struggled to adapt to the deeply religious and austere Portuguese court.
Her outspoken character, political meddling, and unconventional public behaviorfor royal women fueled gossip and malicious rumors, worsened by widespread xenophobia against Spaniards. While her behavior drew harsh criticism, her appearance drew even fiercer attacks. During her time in Lisbon, French writer Laure Junot, Duchess of Abrantès, left one ofthe most scathing descriptions of Carlota, writing: “Her ugliness, her dirty and tangled hair, her thin purple lips adorned witha thick mustache, her uneven teeth like aPan’s flute. I could not convince myself she was a woman, yetI knew the facts atthe time that proved exactly the opposite.
” The Duchess’s husband, Général Jean-Andoche Junot, echoed these sentiments upon arriving atthe Portuguese court, reportedly exclaiming:“My God, how ugly sheis. My God, how ugly the princess is, how ugly they all are. ” French observers werenot the only ones making such barbed remarks. Contemporary accounts repeatedly described Carlota as short, withface scarred by smallpox, aprominent hooked nose, and distinctive “Bourbon” jaw protrusion, while some also noted herslightly stooped posture.
She was in many ways the antithesis ofthe beauties of 18th-century royal courts. One particularly cruel later account even claimed she possessed“the most monstrous and bizarre head that ever walked the face ofthe earth. ” Her public image was onlyone source of her misery. Behind closed doors, Carlota’s married life was also unhappy.
The couple had their first child togetherin1793, adaughter named Maria Teresa. Eight more children followed overthe next 13 years, of whom onlyone, Francisco António, diedin infancy. Despite the growing tensions inher marriage, Carlota was known for her dedication to her children’s health and care. However, even her role asa mother was surrounded by scandal, as persistent court rumors claimed João was not the biological father of all her children, with suspicions focusing particularly on her son Miguel.
These claims were never proven, but they added to the atmosphere of gossip and hostility that surrounded her throughout her life. The marriage suffered from João’s lack of affection, and more so from his increasingly troubled behavior. Inan era when Enlightenment ideas and the French Revolution were sweeping acrossEurope, he developed aobsessive fear that revolution would reachPortugal. Court rumors even claimed he wandered the palace corridors at night ina state ofnear delirium.
By the early 1800s, the royal marriage had become an open political war. In1805, when Carlota was thirty, she conspired to seize power from her husband, the Prince Regent, planning to have him arrested and declared unfit torule, just as his mother had been. However, the plot was exposed, and her co-conspirators were arrested. Carlota escaped imprisonment only because João refused to publicly expose the scandal.
Instead, he banished her tothe palaces of Queluz and Ramalhão while he withdrew to Mafra, effectively ending their marriage. It was during this exile that she earned her infamous nickname“the she-wolf. ”” Carlota’s life inPortugal, especially from1806 onward, was shapedby broader political developments in WesternEurope. A few years after her marriage to João, the French Revolution broke outin1789.
Initially amoderate revolution aimed atestablishing a constitutional monarchy. It gradually became more radical, eventually spiraling intoa counter-revolution and full European war in1792, gradually drawing nearly all powers inEurope into the conflict. Portugal was oneofthe exceptional nations. For centuries, the kingdom had tried to avoid involvementin Europe’s endless dynastic and religious wars.
However, ithad a fragile alliance withEngland dating backto the early1660s, when Catherine of Bragança married King CharlesII of England. This meant Portugal hadjoined the War ofthe First Coalition againstthe Frenchin1793, but it played no major role inthe French Revolutionary Wars that followed until the end ofthe 18th century. What changed everything forPortugal and Carlota was the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte and his conquest ofvast swaths of continental Europe between themid-1790s and mid-1800s. In1807, after conquering Germany and Poland, Napoleon turned west and invaded Portugal, intent on bringing Iberia more firmly into his empire.
He made his brother, Joseph, king of Spain in1808. Beforethat happened, Portugal was occupied, and Carlota fled withthe rest ofthe royal court and government across the Atlantic to establish a governmentin exile inBrazil, Portugal’s vast South American colony. After ahorrific journey inthe winter of1807, during which Carlota was forced to shave her head due toan infestation of lice aboard ship, the Portuguese courtin exile finally arrivedinRio deJaneiro. She spent thenext thirteen years inBrazil, but those years proved tobe some ofthe most turbulent and politically ambitious of her life.
InSouth America, Carlota’s ambitions to rule became fully apparent. While her mother-in-law remained thenominal ruler of Portugal and its colonial empire, events elsewhere inSouth America presented an opportunity for Carlota to expand her influence. Wars of independence broke out across Spain’s colonies inthe late1800s after France seized control of Spain itselfinEurope. A faction inthe Viceroyalty ofthe Río de la Plata even proposed making Carlota regent ofthe territory, amovement known as“Carlotism.
”” This made sense given that Carlota was the daughter of King CharlesIV of Spain. The scheme won support fromBritish Admiral Sir Sidney Smith, but it faced opposition from her husband, the Portuguese governmentin exile, Spanish officials, and many local elites. Carlota also undermined her own chances by insisting on exercising absolute royal powers. While many of her supporters envisioned her asa constitutional figurehead, the movement gradually collapsed, and after the Latin American wars of independence, the United Provinces of the Río de la Plata eventually evolved intothe Republic of Argentina.
Carlota’s time inBrazil was controversial in other ways as well. She was dismissive of people, drank heavily, was allegedly known to drink marijuana tea, and was the subject of persistent rumors aboutan affair witha prominent Brazilian businessman. Yet, amidthe scandal, came the moment she had long awaited. On March 20, 1816, Queen MariaI died atthe age of81.
At age forty, Carlota finally achieved the title she had awaited fordecades, becoming Queen Consort ofPortugal. But after finally obtaining the crown, her major political battles were still ahead of her. By the time they became king and queen, Portugal had long been liberated, asthe Portuguese and Spanish, with significant British assistance, had expelled the French fromthe Iberian Peninsulain1813 and1814, following the collapse of Napoleon’s empire inthe aftermath of his ill-fated invasion of Russia in1812. However, the Portuguese royal court did not immediately returnto Lisbon, even after Napoleon’s final fall inthe summer of1815.
The delay was due todeep uncertainty aboutwhat kind ofkingdom would be reestablished afterthe Napoleonic Wars. That uncertainty finally came toa head withthe Liberal Revolution of1820, when amilitary uprising demanded the establishment ofa constitutional monarchy and forced the royal family to returntoPortugal. On April 26, 1821, they leftBrazil. According tothe Viscount of Porto Seguro, the feelings ofthe king and royal family upon leavingBrazil manifested indeep tears from everyone exceptthe queen.
Carlota, who had reportedly never enjoyed lifeinBrazil, was said tobe delighted to leave. One famous story even claims that before boarding her ship, she dusted off her shoes, declaring:“I will not takeeven the dust of this land withme. ”” After returning toPortugal, João accepted the country’s first constitution in1822. The constitution sought toend absolute monarchyinPortugal.
However, it achieved only limited success and was quickly abandonedin1823. Aroundthe same time, Brazil separated to become an independent empire under Carlota’s son, Pedro, in1822, causing Portugal tolose the colony upon which it had relied for its wealth throughoutthe18th century. The Liberal Revolution was an indication ofthe complex political situationthat Carlota, her husband, and the rest ofthe royal establishment returned to afterthe Napoleonic Wars. A power struggle broke out, with Carlota allying herself withher younger son, Miguel, inan attempt to wrest control fromher husband.
João briefly becamea de facto prisoner, but British interventionin1824 led toMiguel’s exile and the restoration of João and his supporters’ control overthe government. João ruled thereafter until his deathin March1826 atthe age of58. It was amarriage that had survived untilone partner’s death, despite their mutual animosity, and she refused tovisit him duringhis final illness. João’s death plungedPortugal intoa complex succession crisis.
Miguel, the expected heir, was stillin exile. Meanwhile, as noted, his older brother Pedro ruled the newly independent Empire ofBrazil. Pedro briefly claimed the Portuguese throne before abdicatingin favor ofhis young daughter, who became QueenMariathe Second inMay1826. Miguel later returnedin1828 to seize the crown, with a plan to avoidcivil war by marrying his niece, Queen Maria.
But this never happened. Bythe time of this rapid succession of rulers between1826 and1828, Carlota had been sidelined from Portuguese politics. Despite Miguel’s earlier alliance with his mother, he did not recall her tothe court afterbecoming kingin1828. Instead, she spent her final years inbitterness, away from court life, living inthe countryside outside Lisbonat Queluz Palace.
She died onJanuary 7, 1830, atthe age of54. Bythat time, anew civil war had brokenout, ending four years later with Miguel’s deposition. Miguel spent theremaining 32 years ofhis lifein exile, with Queen MariaII restored tothe thronein1834. Carlota was initially buried inSintra before her remains were transferredin1854 tobe buried beside her husband inthe royal pantheon ofthe Braganza dynastyinLisbon.
Although she always aspired togreater power, Carlota spent her adult life atthe heart ofone ofthe largest monarchiesinthe world, asqueen or princess consort ofPortugal and its vastempire stretching acrossBrazil, Africa, and Asia. Toher enemies, she was an ugly, scheming, power-hungry foreign queen. Toothers, she was an intelligent, determined woman who refused toaccept the constraints placed onroyal women inher era. Perhaps the truth lies somewhereinbetween.
Either way, she remains oneofthe most controversial and fascinating queens inIberian history.
