the most obscure historical question ever asked

Yes, this IS the most obscure historical question ever asked.

obscure question
I think I have one even more obscure, but it's about science. Why don't birds ever get struck by lightning?

What makes you think birds are never struck by lightening?

In flight, they are not grounded. If they are in a tree that is struck they should be served with a nice barbecue sauce and potatos.

Hash brown potatoes--you know, the shredded kind ?

Yeah, dipping sauce, waffle fries and beer go good with struck duck.

Perhaps that's where the term "flash fried" comes from...

From a French King and Queen being executed to frying fish in just a few posts is quite a feat. Could someone try and answer my first question.

So you want to know where the bodies were buried and who knew where they were, right?

Maybe the graves are empty and are there as a memorial only?

Or, Historians were able to find most of Tsar Nicholas II's family after 80 years of burial. Maybe Louis and Marie's temporary final (?)resting place was public knowledge at the time.


Speaking of electricity, why don't electric eels electrocute themselves? How do they make baby electric eels without killing each other? Why don't they short-circuit in the water? Can you use an electric eel to start your car if the battery's dead? How about power your radio?

Yeah, an' Jimmy Hoffa, too, while yer at it . . .

At the Paris church, Saint Denis Basilique, where France has buried it's royal dead for centuries, a large crypt reportedly contains the remains of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI (d.1793) along with those of several others including the last Louis, the XVIII, who reigned from 1814-1824.
http://www.mike-reed.com/images/Famous%20Dead%20People/Louis_16_King_of_France_-_Paris_France_1.jpg

Louis XVIII also built La chapelle Expiatore (1816) as a memorial to those two, (described as "over his brother's grave" on some pages) and the 3000 or so others who died in the Revolution.

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The fun part is they are probably in both places or neither. To wit:
La Chappelle Expiatore This small chapel honors Marie-Antoinette and her husband King Louis XVI, whose bodies were unceremoniously dumped into lime pits here, after their beheading (along with 3000 other headless Revolution victims, including Charlotte Corday, who assassinated Marat, and Madame DuBarry, mistress of Louis XV). Whatever your thoughts on Marie or religion, this feels like a sacred place. There are statues of Marie and Louis, a beautiful dome, and an underground chapel and crypt. The park outside (Square Louis XVI) is a peaceful slice of green in an otherwise busy section of Paris.

Louis XVIII had Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette's remains transfered to the royal tomb in St-Denis in 1815, 22 years after the guillotine had ended their lives. At his request this memorial chapel was built (1816-1826) to honor the first resting place of his brother and his sister-in-law.

My emphasis above.
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My answer to you, dov, is that graves and gravesites are often symbolic. I believe that is the case here unless someone can show that French science had progressed in 1815 to the point of today's DNA testing. Finding the right (headless, limed) bodies would have been impossible at the time, so some remains were removed and moved, crypts erected and dedicated, and the French went on with lives. There is the possibility I suppose, that even in the chaos of the Revolution certain parties kept track of whose body/head went into the pit and where it was last seen, but I haven't found anything to indicate that that happened.

Joe

Let them eat cake!

Actually, Maria Antonietta (her baptismal name, Marie Antoinette is the French version thereof) cordially hated the French people, who had been viciously unkind to her from her arrival as a confused and somewhat frightened teen-aged bride. When she failed to immediately produce any children, she was accused of being a lesbian, and thought which sufficiently titilated the French, that the nasty stories (without any foundation) continued even after she produced an heir. In her letters to her mother, Maria Theresa, she made it clear, without being vulgar, that Louis couldn't get it up. They were married for nearly four years before Louis physically consummated the marriage. She was, nonetheless a loyal wife, and hid her distaste for the French. By the time of the bread shortages in 1789, i think she finally slipped, and vented a little spleen at a people who had been so cruel to her, without any cause.

What she said was: "Qu'ils mangent de la croute." This means, "Let them eat crust(s)." and refers to the habit of the aristocracy of having fresh bread each day, from which the crust had been removed before it was delivered. It was certainly insensitive, and it did not merit her execution. But, like those who executed Charles I of England in 1649, once embarked upon the course which they had chosen, the powers that were in revolutionary France at the time could not leave the King alive as a focus for opposition and attack. It was in the nature of the times and the events that only great tragedy would ensue.

Can a dummy ever be President of the USA? Of course not, the parties and people will always protect this country - oops, sorry, not obscure anymore!

Let them eat crumbs ..........

Actually Maria Antonia:

Marie Antoinette was born in 1755. She was one of the 16 children of Maria Theresa, archduchess of Austria and queen of Hungary and Bohemia, and Holy Roman emperor Francis I. Her original name was Maria Antonia; Marie Antoinette was the name she took when she married.

Very interesting. Thanks for the look into who she really was.

What's with Setanta and his shredded potato obsession? And what happened to your dog, dare I ask?

Just as a sideline, Marie Antoinette's breasts supposedly inspired the worst champagne glass ever made, the shallow coupe. Tall flutes are far superior.