[2] On 13 July 1793, having travelled to Paris and obtained an audience with Marat, Corday fatally stabbed him with a knife while he was taking a medicinal bath.

Corday was immediately arrested, found guilty by the Revolutionary Tribunal and on 17 July, four days after Marat's death, executed by the guillotine on the Place de Grève.

Born in Saint-Saturnin-des-Ligneries, a hamlet in the commune of Écorches (Orne), in Normandy,[3] Corday was a member of a minor aristocratic family.

[5]: 157 Corday's physical appearance is described on her passport as "five feet and one inch ... hair and eyebrows auburn, eyes gray, forehead high, mouth medium size, chin dimpled, and an oval face".

[8][page needed] The influence of Girondin ideas on Corday is evident in her words at her trial: "I have killed one man to save a hundred thousand.

Corday's notion that she was saving a hundred thousand lives echoes this Girondin sentiment as they attempted to slow the revolution and reverse the violence that had escalated since the September Massacres of 1792.

[citation needed] Jean-Paul Marat was a member of the radical Jacobin faction that had a leading role during the Reign of Terror.

[5]: 160 On 9 July 1793 Corday left her aunt, carrying a copy of Plutarch's Parallel Lives, and went to Paris where she took a room at the Hôtel de Providence.

During the next few days, she wrote her Adresse aux Français amis des lois et de la paix ("Address to the French, friends of Law and Peace") to explain her motives for assassinating Marat.

She intended to make an example of him, but upon arriving in Paris she discovered that Marat no longer attended meetings because his health was deteriorating from a skin disorder (perhaps dermatitis herpetiformis).

Republican officials arrived to interrogate Corday and to calm a hysterical crowd who appeared ready to lynch her.

[19] Corday asked for Gustave le Doulcet, an old acquaintance, to defend her, but he did not receive the letter she wrote to him in time, so Claude François Chauveau-Lagarde was appointed instead to assist her during the trial.

"[23]: 75  Given permission, she selected as the artist a National Guard officer, Jean-Jacques Hauer, who had already begun sketching her from the gallery of the courtroom.

[24] Since her execution, many authors have written describing Corday as a natural blonde, primarily ascribed from the portrait by Hauer.

[25] On 17 July 1793, four days after Marat was killed, Corday was executed by the guillotine in the Place de Grève wearing the red overblouse denoting a condemned traitor who had assassinated a representative of the people.

Standing alone in the tumbril amid a large and curious crowd she remained calm, although drenched by a sudden summer rainfall.

[31] The direct consequences of her crime were opposite to what she expected: the assassination did not stop the Jacobins or the Reign of Terror, which intensified after the murder.

[32] Corday's action aided in restructuring the private versus public role of the woman in society at the time.

There have been suggestions that her act incited the banning of women's political clubs and the executions of female activists such as the Girondin Madame Roland.

And we, vile eunuchs, a cowardly herd without a soul, We know how to repeat a few complaints from a woman, But the iron would be heavy in our feeble hands.

"[35] After Corday murdered Marat, many women distanced themselves from her because they believed that what she had done would spark a reaction against the developing feminist movement, which was already facing criticism.