Born at Versailles, Marie-Thérèse Charlotte de France, otherwise known as “Madame Royale”, was the eldest child of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette. She spent her childhood in the court and was one of the few royal children to survive the French Revolution.

While the most famous members of the French royal family, King Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette, were famously executed by guillotine during the French Revolution in 1793, several members of the Bourbon family did survive. Their eldest daughter, Marie-Thérèse-Charlotte, survived her imprisonment in the Temple and was eventually released in a prisoner exchange with Austria; she lived until 1851, often referred to as "Madame Royale." The King's brothers, the Count of Provence and the Count of Artois, had emigrated early in the Revolution and survived in exile, later returning to France to reign as Louis XVIII and Charles X respectively during the Bourbon Restoration (1814–1830). Tragically, the "Lost Dauphin," Louis-Charles (Louis XVII), died at the age of 10 while in revolutionary custody due to illness and neglect, though his death sparked decades of "pretender" theories. Additionally, the junior branch of the family, the House of Orléans, also survived, with Louis-Philippe I eventually becoming the "Citizen King" in 1830. Descendants of these royal lines still exist today, and while France is a republic, they are still recognized by some as titular claimants to the long-defunct French throne.