ABSTRACT
This article analyzes the letters that Empress Maria Theresa of Austria wrote her daughter-in-law Maria Beatrice d’Este between 1772 and 1780. Hardly a week went by in which the aged Habsburg matriarch’s letters did not address the topics of pregnancy and childbirth. Placing these epistles at the crossroads of the history of the female body and pregnancy on the one hand and dynastic history in this very period on the other, the article sheds light on Maria Theresa’s attempts to exert control over and create narratives around Maria Beatrice’s experience of her pregnant body. It shows that the letters point to both the great importance of pregnancy for dynastic reproduction and the empress’ attempt to establish a close emotional relationship with her daughter-in-law.
