 Until recently the accepted date of Bashkirtseff's birth was 11 November [23 November New Style], 1860.After the discovery of the original manuscript of Bashkirtseff's journal in the Bibliothèque nationale de France, however, it was found that her journal had been abridged and censored by her family in its first editions.Her date of birth (1858 not 1860) was falsified by her mother to make Bashkirtseff appear even more precocious.