A marriage is arranged between Princess Isabella…
October 1760 CE
After a marriage by proxy, Isabella is escorted to Austria.
At the age of eighteen, Isabella marries Joseph II on October 6, 1760, in a ceremony lasting for days.
Joseph is thrilled with his new bride and overwhelms Isabella with his love.
In return, she increasingly locks herself away, so much so that shortly after their wedding, Isabella is plunged into melancholy.
Born Isabella Maria Luisa Antonietta Ferdinanda Giuseppina Saveria Dominica Giovanna at Buen Retiro Palace in Madrid, she is an Infanta of Spain and has grown up at the court of her grandfather, Philip V of Spain.
Her father is the Spanish Prince Philip, who is Duke of Parma in Italy.
Her mother was the fourteen-year-old Elisabeth of France, the eldest daughter of Louis XV of France.
Isabella's parents' marriage had not been happy, and for nearly ten years Isabella had remained an only child.
Isabella had been very close to her mother and was distraught when she died of smallpox in 1759.
Henceforth, Isabella has been convinced she, too, will die young.