Édouard Manet was born in Paris on 23 January 1832, in the ancestral
hôtel particulier (mansion) on the rue des Petits Augustins (now
rue Bonaparte) to an affluent and well-connected family.
[3] His mother, Eugénie-Desirée Fournier, was the daughter of a diplomat and goddaughter of the Swedish crown prince
Charles Bernadotte, from whom the Swedish monarchs are descended. His father, Auguste Manet, was a French judge who expected Édouard to pursue a career in law. His uncle, Edmond Fournier, encouraged him to pursue painting and took young Manet to the
Louvre.
[4] In 1841 he enrolled at secondary school, the
Collège Rollin. In 1845, at the advice of his uncle, Manet enrolled in a special course of drawing where he met
Antonin Proust, future Minister of Fine Arts and subsequent lifelong friend.