Portrait of Ewelina Hańska by Holz Sowgen, about 1825

Countess Ewelina Hańska née Rzewuska (January 6, 1801, Pohrebyszcze (today: Pohrebysche, Vinnytsia Oblast, Ukraine) - April 10, 1882, Paris) was a Polish noblewoman (szlachcianka).

Ewelina was the sister of Henryk Rzewuski. She was married to Wacław Hański, a landowning noble, who was twenty years older than her. After his death she became wife of the French novelist Honoré de Balzac in 1850.

Balzac first met the countess Hańska in 1833, and from then on they regularly corresponded. In 1841 the countess's husband died, and in 1843 Balzac travelled to St. Petersburg to meet her. They went on several voyages together (Germany, Belgium, Italy). In 1846 she had a stillborn child. In 1847, they travelled through Ukraine, then Balzac returned to Paris in 1848. He went back to Ukraine a year later, and finally married the countess Hańska, on March 14, 1850. Honoré de Balzac died five months later, on August 18, in Paris.

[edit] References

• Lettres à l'Étrangère, t. 1-5 1899-1960 (Love letters)

[edit] Further reading

• Cronin, Vincent. Four Women in Pursuit of an Ideal. London: Collins, 1965; also published as The Romantic Way. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1966.

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