{{Short description|French writer}} {{Use dmy dates|date=May 2026}} '''Marie du Fresnay''' ({{IPA|fr|maʁi dy fʁɛnɛ}}), or '''Maria du Fresnay''', née Daminois (1809–1892), was a French writer.
She was the mistress of Honoré de Balzac, by whom she had a daughter, Marie-Caroline du Fresnay<ref name ="base_joconde">{{Base Joconde|11020000064|Marie Caroline Du Fresnay, fille de Marie-Louise-Françoise Daminois et d'Honoré de Balzac}}</ref> (b. 4 June 1834), the only child of the French author. Her own mother was the playwright and novelist Adèle Daminois.
She was also the mother of French knight Ange Du Fresnay and the ancestor of French writer and silent film director Guy du Fresnay as well as of French contemporary essayist and economist Philippe du Fresnay.
Her life inspired Balzac's most famous novel, ''Eugénie Grandet'' (1833), which depicted in part her family,<ref name = "lefresnay">{{cite web|url=http://comite-vieuxpays-lefresnay.jimdo.com/histoire-du-quartier/une-rue-une-histoire/|title=Le quartier Du Fresnay|work=comite-vieuxpays-lefresnay.jimdo.com|accessdate=6 April 2014|trans-title=The neighborhood of Du Fresnay|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303185209/http://comite-vieuxpays-lefresnay.jimdo.com/histoire-du-quartier/une-rue-une-histoire/|archive-date=3 March 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref> who were living at the time in the French city of Sartrouville.<ref name = "chancerel_pierrot">{{citation|last1=Chancerel|first1=Pierrot|title=La véritable Eugénie Grandet : Marie du Fresnay|magazine=Revue des sciences humaines|date=10 November 1955|language=fr|trans-title=The real Eugénie Grandet: Marie du Fresnay}}</ref>
== Biography ==
In 1833, as he revealed in a letter to his sister, Balzac entered into a secret intrigue with Marie du Fresnay,<ref>{{cite book|title=La Revue de Paris, Volume 67, Part 3|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BhgZAAAAIAAJ|year=1960|publisher=Bureau de la Revue de Paris.|page=122}}</ref> who was then aged 24. Her marriage to Charles Antoine du Fresnay, a son of Charles du Fresnay, former mayor of Sartrouville (portrayed in ''Eugénie Grandet'' as Charles Grandet, a nephew of the former mayor of Saumur) had been a failure from the start, with a 23-year age difference between them.<ref name = "chancerel_pierrot"/> In this letter, Balzac reveals that the young woman had just come to tell him she was pregnant.
In 1834, eight months following Balzac's letter to his sister, Maria du Fresnay's daughter Marie-Caroline was born.
In 1839, she appears as the dedicatee of the second edition of Balzac's ''Eugenie Grandet''<ref>{{citation|title=Eugénie Grandet|author= Honoré de Balzac}}</ref> under the pseudonym "Maria", which was her nickname in her social circle. This is also the year of birth of her second son and third child, Ange du Fresnay.
In 1850, she would inherit from Balzac a statue of the French sculptor Francois Girardon, which confirmed the rumor of his paternity. However, the link was only confirmed in 1946, when Maria's grandson Charles du Fresnay told French journalist and historian Roger Pierrot<ref name="chancerel_pierrot"/> that Marie's nickname used to be "Maria".
== Bibliography == * {{citation|first1=Antoine|last1=Adam|title=Marie du Fresnay, fille d'Eugénie Grandet et de Balzac|magazine=Les Lettres françaises|date=8 December 1956|pages=632–648|language=fr}} * Gilbert Guislain, "Balzac", Studyrama, 2004 (page 81) * {{citation|first1=Honoré|last1=de Balzac|title=Eugénié Grandet|date=8 December 1839|pages=2–4|language=fr}}
== References == {{Reflist|2}}
{{Eugénie Grandet}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fresnay, Marie du}} Category:1809 births Category:Honoré de Balzac Category:Year of death missing Category:19th-century French writers Category:19th-century French women writers Category:People from Sartrouville