Career
Having no children of her own, Maria Anna negotiated with Frederick II of Prussia after her husband"s death in 1777 to secure Bavaria"s independence against Austria and to support the succession rights of the Wittelsbach branch Palatinate Zweibrücken-Birkenfeld in Bavaria when the new Elector Charles Theodore attempted to cede Lower Bavaria to Austria. A secret treaty with Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II had been concluded. In exchange for Lower Bavaria, Charles Theodore was to receive the Austrian Netherlands (close to his ancestral domains), the Palatinate (already his patrimony), Jülich and Berg.
These plans failed with the War of the Bavarian Succession in 1778, in which the Prussian king stifled the Austrian attempts to exchange the Austrian Netherlands for Bavaria.
When Emperor Joseph II tried the scheme again in 1784, Frederick created the Fürstenbund. Titles and styles
29 August 1728 – 9 July 1747: Her Serene Highness Princess Maria Anna Sophia of Saxony
9 July 1747 – 30 December 1777: Her Serene Highness The Electress of Bavaria
30 December 1777 – 17 February 1797: Her Serene Highness The Dowager Electress of Bavaria.