Francisca Joias was a Portuguese princess and soldier who loved animals and the outdoors. She was thirty-five in 1810, when she was married to a Portuguese nobleman and became the first lady of Portugal. She represented her country in the Spanish throne and remained there for the duration of the Restoration Period. The restoration was instigated by a spirit of revolution and it meant that all the privileges of the royalty were taken away from the masses and this included the right of the woman to get married.
So, when did Francisca Joias become the most famous personality of her time? She enjoyed a great success as a mistress in the nobility and later in her career as a writer, actress and dancer, although all of these endeavors never materialized as she never really had the success in any of her endeavors. All her relationships ended rather sour, probably because of her height and the demand of having men taller than her. Her height enabled her to be involved in almost all the important events of her day and she was looked up to by the Spanish royal family. This also caused her lack of interest in other people’s affairs.
After her marriage to Don Carlos she retired to a country estate in Portugal and lived a quiet life, although she always maintained an interest in art, music, painting and architecture. It was during the eighteen hundreds that she began to take an interest in acting, and she appeared in some very good plays and was finally accepted into the Royal Dramatic Theatre in London. She retired to a country estate in Portugal and died at the age of thirty-five in Rio de Janeiro. It is said that her spirit may still dwell there, waiting for someone to bring her back to the world.