She was born a German princess, the last child of Adolph I, Duke of Cleves and his second wife, Mary of Burgundy.

Marie was a patron of letters and commissioned many works; she was also an active poet herself, producing ballads and other verses.

[1] After the Duke's death she was secretly remarried in 1480 to one of her gentlemen of the chamber, the Artesian "Sieur de Rabodanges", who was some years her junior.

At the age of fourteen, Marie was married to 46-year-old Charles of Valois, Duke of Orléans, a man 32 years her senior,[1] on 27 November 1440, in Saint-Omer.

They had three children together, being: Marie is a character in Hella Haasse's historical novel about Charles, Duke of Orléans In a Dark Wood Wandering (original Dutch title Het Woud der Verwachting).