Elisabeth Farnese

Born in Parma in 1692, Elisabeth was the sole surviving child of a hereditary prince who died when she was an infant. Her mother remarried her uncle in a failed bid for another heir, leaving Elisabeth the only heiress—and a high-stakes matrimonial prize. In 1714 she married Spain's Philip V, whose first wife had just died, and within months had dismantled the French faction at court and seized control of foreign policy while her husband's mental incapacity gave her room to maneuver. She launched the War of the Quadruple Alliance in a bid to install her children on European thrones, failed, ear…