Their marriage was instrumental in almost reviving French hopes of reinstating the Bonaparte dynasty into a position of power, as seen in the days of Napoleon III.

[4] Their marriage was often compared to that of an elephant and a gazelle; the bridegroom had strong Napoleonic features (broad, bulky, and ponderous) while the bride appeared frail, short, fair-haired, and with the characteristic nose of the House of Savoy.

Their official reception into Paris on 4 February was greeted very coldly by Parisians, not out of disrespect for a daughter of the king of Sardinia, but instead out of dislike for her new husband.

[4] Indeed, all her life public sympathy tended to lean in her favour; she was fondly regarded as retiring, charitable, pious, and trapped in an unhappy marriage.

One source attributes the marriage to the fact that Amadeus felt great love for his niece, but it states that Maria Letizia's decision was simply a "strong desire for independence on the part of the Princess because of the heaviness of the maternal yoke".

[9] In preparation for the marriage, she received a great number of notable gifts from personages such as Empress Eugenie, the widowed wife of Napoleon III, and Amadeus's three sons.

[10] Eugenie sent her some "great and illustrious" family jewels, and the boys gave her a necklace with seven rows of pearls that was valued at $60,000.

[10] The couple planned to marry in Turin in the hopes of turning the city into a "brilliant centre of attraction in Italy".

The large age difference made Maria Letizia only three years older than Amadeus's eldest child.

[13] One article stated that at the time of their marriage, a Bonaparte would have had an easy chance of obtaining at least two million votes if a plebiscite were to occur.

That meant that any wealth that Amadeus had accumulated went to his first three children, which left little to nothing upon his death for Maria Letizia and their son Umberto.

[8] That dependency would cause problems later, as Umberto often angered his cousin Victor Emmanuel III of Italy, the head of the House of Savoy.

[15] He had recently been dismissed from the naval academy in Livorno for what was apparently incorrigible behavior and for amorous attentions to some young women in the town.

[15] During her widowhood, Maria Letizia maintained an open and scandalous relationship with a military man twenty years her junior, who later wed the opera singer Vina Bovy.