1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Guimard, Marie Madeleine

GUIMARD, MARIE MADELEINE (1743–1816), French dancer, was born in Paris on the 10th of October 1743. For twenty-five years she was the star of the Paris Opéra. She made herself even more famous by her love affairs, especially by her long liaison with the prince de Soubise. She bought a magnificent house at Pantin, and built a private theatre connected with it, where Collé’s Partie de chasse de Henri IV which was prohibited in public, and most of the Proverbes of Carmontelle (Louis Carrogis, 1717–1806), and similar licentious performances were given to the delight of high society. In 1772, in defiance of the archbishop of Paris, she opened a gorgeous house with a theatre seating five hundred spectators in the Chaussée d’Antin. In this Temple of Terpsichore, as she named it, the wildest orgies took place. In 1786 she was compelled to get rid of the property, and it was disposed of by lottery for her benefit for the sum of 300,000 francs. Soon after her retirement in 1789 she married Jean Etienne Despréaux (1748–1820), dancer, song-writer and playwright.