Editing Château de Chenonceau (section)

===Louise Dupin===
[[File:Louise Marie Madeleine Fontaine by Jean-Marc Nattier, ca 1733.jpg|thumb|[[Louise Dupin]] by [[Jean-Marc Nattier|Nattier]]]]

In 1733 the estate was sold for 130,000&nbsp;[[French livre|livres]] to a wealthy squire named {{Interlanguage link multi|Claude Dupin|fr}}.{{sfn|Garrett|2010|p=108}} His wife, [[Louise Dupin]], was the natural daughter of the financier [[Samuel Bernard (financier)|Samuel Bernard]] and the actress {{Interlanguage link multi|Manon Dancourt|fr}}, whose mother was also an actress who had joined the [[Comédie Française]] in 1684. Louise Dupin was "an intelligent, beautiful, and highly cultivated woman who had the theatre in her blood."{{sfn|Gaigneron|1993|p=20}} Claude Dupin, a widower, had a son, Louis Claude, from his first wife [[Marie-Aurore de Saxe]], who was the grandmother of [[George Sand]] (born Aurore Dupin).<ref>The confusions of father and son and of Marie Aurore and Louise Dupin have been clarified by the George Sand scholar, Georges Lubin {{harv|Gaigneron|1993|p=20}}</ref>

Louise Dupin's literary salon at Chenonceau attracted such  leaders of the [[Age of Enlightenment|Enlightenment]] as the writers [[Voltaire]], [[Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu|Montesquieu]], and  [[Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle|Fontenelle]], the naturalist [[Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon|Buffon]], the playwright [[Pierre de Marivaux|Marivaux]], the philosopher [[Étienne Bonnot de Condillac|Condillac]], as well as the [[Claudine Guérin de Tencin|Marquise de Tencin]] and the [[Marquise du Deffand]].{{sfnm|Garrett|2010|1p=108|Gaigneron|1993|2p=20}} [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]] was Dupin's secretary and tutored her son. Rousseau, who worked on ''Émile'' at Chenonceau, wrote in his ''Confessions'': "We played music there and staged comedies. I wrote a play in verse entitled ''Sylvie's Path'', after the name of a path in the park along the Cher."<ref>Translated and quoted in {{harvnb|Gaigneron|1993|p=20}}.</ref>

The widowed Louise Dupin saved the château from destruction during the [[French Revolution]], preserving it from being destroyed by the Revolutionaries because "it was essential to travel and commerce, being the only bridge across the river for many miles."<ref name=Beck454>Beck 2011, p. 454.</ref> <!-- The following is likely misinformation: "She is said to be the one who changed the spelling of the Château (from Chenonceaux to Chenonceau) to please the villagers during the French Revolution. She dropped the "x" at the end of the château's name to differentiate what was a symbol of royalty from the Republic. Although no official sources have been found to support this legend, the château has been since referred to and accepted as Chenonceau." Du Cerceau spelt the name without the "x" in 1579, and many modern sources use the "x". See also Hanser 2006, p. 61. -->