The Birkin Bag is the ultimate status symbol : wildly expensive, ridiculously hard to get and immediately identifiable. Real Housewives collect it, hip-hop artists rap about it and “Sex and the City” once devoted an episode to it.

Yet, according to Marisa Meltzer’s new biography, “ It Girl: The Life and Legacy of Jane Birkin ” (Atria Books, out Tuesday), the woman who inspired the pricey Hermés purse was the ultimate bohemian — and a scandalous one at that. 12

She was condemned by the Vatican for her racy music, had three children with three different men and still managed to stay out all night partying in her signature mini dresses (sometimes with a baby in tow).

“The term ‘It Girl’ is a shorthand for her unique brand of fame,” Meltzer writes, “but it’s just the beginning of

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