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Credit: Unknown artist, restored by Adam Cuerden
Julie d'Aubigny, (1670/1673–1707), better known as Mademoiselle Maupin or La Maupin, was a 17th-century opera singer. Little is known for certain about her life; her tumultuous career and flamboyant lifestyle were the subject of gossip, rumor, and colourful stories in her own time, and inspired numerous fictional and semi-fictional portrayals afterwards. Théophile Gautier loosely based the title character, Madeleine de Maupin, of his novel Mademoiselle de Maupin (1835) on her. The part written for her in Tancrède, Clorinde, is considered the first example of writing for the contralto voice in French opera.