Editing Christina, Queen of Sweden (section)

===Marriage issue===

[[File:David Beck - Christina, Queen of Sweden 1644-1654 - Google Art Project.jpg|thumb|left|Christina by [[David Beck]]]]

By the age of nine, Christina was already impressed by the Catholic religion and the merits of [[celibacy]].<ref name="auto">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SJxEw4nVDXQC&pg=PA565|title=Rome and the Counter-Reformation in Scandinavia: The Age of Gustavus Adolphus and Queen Christina of Sweden, 1622-1656|first=Oskar|last=Garstein|date=10 July 1992|publisher=BRILL|access-date=10 July 2017|via=Google Books|isbn=9004093958}}</ref> She read a biography of the virgin queen [[Elizabeth I of England]] with interest. But Christina understood that she was expected to provide an heir to the Swedish throne. Her first cousin Charles was infatuated with her, and they became secretly engaged before he left in 1642 to serve in the Swedish army in Germany for three years. Christina revealed in her autobiography that she felt "an insurmountable distaste for marriage" and "for all the things that females talked about and did." She once stated, "It takes more courage to marry than to go to war."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Birch |first=Una |title=Maxims of a Queen |year=1907 |pages=33}}</ref> As she was chiefly occupied with her studies, she slept three to four hours a night, forgot to comb her hair, donned her clothes in a hurry and wore men's shoes for the sake of convenience. (In fact, her permanent bed-head became her trademark look in paintings.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.factinate.com/people/facts-christina-queen-sweden/ | title=Disobedient Facts About Christina of Sweden, the Troublemaker Queen | date=5 April 2019 }}</ref>) When Christina left Sweden, she continued to write passionate letters to her intimate friend Ebba Sparre, in which she told her that she would always love her. However, such emotional letters were relatively common at that time, and Christina would use the same style when writing to women she had never met but whose writings she admired.<ref name="crompton"/> <!--It has also been pointed out, however, that Christina used the same emotional style when writing to men and women she had never met (those whose writings she admired), and there is conjecture as to the context of her letters to Sparre.<ref name="Elisabeth Aasen: Barokke damer">Elisabeth Aasen: ''Barokke damer''</ref>-->