Carte-de-visite head and shoulders photograph of Duchess Maria Josefa of Bavaria, in a vignette format. The subject is shown in three quarter view, facing towards the left of the image. Her hair is arranged in a chignon on the top of her head and decorated with jewelled pins. She is wearing a high-necked white blouse beneath a mid-coloured silk dress, trimmed at the neck with a darker band of velvet embroidered with white floral motifs. The bodice of the dress is fastened up the front with prominent buttons. She is wearing a large, oval pendant on a heavy chain around her neck.

Maria Josefa was the fourth child and third daughter of King Miguel I of Portugal and his wife Adelaide of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Rosenberg. In 1874 she became the second wife of Duke Karl Theodor of Bavaria and the couple had five children.