#also so many biographies of maximilian tie him with reichstadt it's crazy

[archduchessofnowhere]

Not sure if you've answered this before, but since you've been posting recently about Napoleon II I'd thought I'd ask. Do you think there's any credence to the rumours of an affair between Sophie of Bavaria and Napoleon II? From what I know of Sophie, it seems more likely, if there was an affair, it was emotional rather than physical. But I do like the idea of Maximilian being his son, even if I do think it's unlikely

Hello! No, I haven't talked about this before. Before answering I feel the need to add a disclaimer (?) that only recently I've started to get into Napoleonic history and what came after. So there probably are people here who know way more about Napoleon II than I do and can answer better.

Now coming back to the question: is there any credence on Sophie and Napoleon II aka the Duke of Reichstadt aka Franz having an affair? The answer is that we can't really know for sure. There isn't any tangible evidence that proves that they had an affair, but neither we can disprove it: they did spent a lot of time together and adored each other. Historians don't seem to agree on this either, and even those who don't believe it still add something along the lines of "whether it happened or not..." because we weren't there so we can't really know (it's funny in the case of the author I quoted in my post from earlier because she couldn't seem to made her mind on whether she believed it or not, and constantly went from "Maximilian was totally a Habsburg" to "Iowkey I actually think it makes sense that he was Reichstadt's son").

For my part, I also feel that a physical affair was not super likely, and that there relationship was more like a romantic friendship. However I also really like to think that Maximilian was his son lol. It just adds a layer to their stories that makes them more emotional I think? First of all, Max was Sophie's favourite son. Isn't it more tragic if this was because he was the son of her deceased lover? Doesn't this add another reason as to why Franz Josef was jealous of his brother and tried to keep him away of positions of power at all cost? Wouldn't this make even more ironic that Napoleon III put him in the throne of Mexico and then abandoned him to his luck there?

And then we have Franz, from whom everybody expected so much: he was the son of Napoleon! The grandson of emperor Franz! He was meant to be someone great, and yet he died so young in such an ordinary way. It's not only sad, it is anticlimactic. We like our history ordered, like a story, and Franz's story doesn't end in a satisfactory note, so there is this need of looking for a sort of continuation. And there is a narrative in their history that just screams to become a story: Max was born when Franz was dying, he was also a talented young man from whom everybody expected so much, he also died young. Thus Franz's story turns into a tragic love story of a forbidden love, and if he had a son that, unknowingly, continued the legacy of his dynasty and created a new empire in the new world, Franz's story doesn't end with him in his bed dying of consumption: it ends with Maximilian dying heroically under a fire squad, it ends with them being buried together.

I ended up digressing badly sorry, let's go back to the question. Until something like, I don't know, the secret diary or correspondence of Sophie and Franz appears we can't prove that there was an affair. All the evidence is circunstancial, and they might have just been friends. But from what I read, I do think that Franz was the person that Sophie loved the most after her children, whether it was romantic or platonic.

TL; DR: no, there isn't much evidence, however we can't say it never happened either. Also it does make for a great story so personally I think that historical fiction should just embrace it ngl (to quote a now ancient proverb: historical inaccuracies are good as long as I like them)