Therese was the third child and only daughter of Luitpold, Prince Regent of Bavaria, and of his wife Archduchess Augusta of Austria.

Therese descended from the House of Wittelsbach, one of Europe's most powerful royal families which had ruled Bavaria for 738 years.

However, by the time she was born, the Bavarian crown's political power had been reduced and the 19th Century Wittelsbach kings were mostly remembered for their cultural patronage and the architectural legacy.

[6] Her interests in geology, botany, anthropology and zoology required her to attain tutors, since women at the time were not allowed to study at universities.

In 1871, at the age of 21, she started a series of journeys, first to Italy and Greece, then throughout Europe and North Africa, the Middle East and the Americas.

In the company of a servant trained in taxidermy, a lady in waiting, and a Kavalier for her protection, she travelled 1000 miles upriver to Manaus.

A railway trip through the high mountains of the Campos country followed, where she acquired a sizable collection of mineral specimens and visited the Academy of Mines in Ouro Preto.

[9] In Rio de Janeiro she also met with Princess Imperial of Brazil Isabel,[10] who had sponsored scientific expeditions and helped to establish collections that publicised Brazilian gems, minerals, plants, flowers, birds, butterflies and insects.

[12] Her publication Meine Reise in die Brasilianischen Tropen (My Trip to the Brazilian Tropics), an illustrated travel journal of botanical, geological, and zoological information, was published in 1897.