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Framed and on the wall
Frame and rooms are illustrations of how the piece could look; it is sold unframed unless the description says otherwise.
Arrival in France, the Bonapartes Flee Ajaccio, Antique Madou Lithograph, 1827
£165
$220 · €195
Original print, not a reproduction.
Ships worldwide from the Netherlands, flat, insured and tracked. 14-day returns.
- Date
- 1827
- Technique
- Lithograph
- Coloring
- Uncolored
- Condition
- Good. Age toning, darker at the edges; handling soiling along the edges and scattered foxing in the margins. Printed image clean.
- Collection
- Battle scenes
- Era
- 1790 to 1815, Napoleonic wars
- Stock no.
- BG-14174-3-3
What the condition grades mean
- Excellent
- Bright and clean, with no faults worth mentioning.
- Very good
- Only light signs of age, such as faint toning.
- Good
- Normal signs of age for a sheet of this period: toning, some foxing, small marks or neat old repairs.
- Fair
- Clear faults such as staining, tears or repairs, priced to match.
Every fault we see is written in the condition note, and the whole sheet is shown uncropped in the photos.
An original antique lithograph of the Bonaparte family leaving Corsica by boat, plate 2 from Madou's Vie de Napoléon, published at Brussels in 1827. The sheet is lettered ARRIVÉE EN FRANCE in open capitals above the image, numbered No. 2 at the lower left and lettered Lith. de Jobard at the lower right. A crowded open boat under a single sail pulls away from a harbor mole in a rising sea, the women of the family gathered amidships, a sailor fending off with a pole at the bow and a young officer in a bicorne seated at the stern.
The printed caption below the image reads: Les Anglais ayant brûlé Ajaccio, Bonaparte en fut banni à perpétuité; avec lui s'embarquèrent ses frères qui tous devaient régner, un frêle esquif les reçoit et porte à travers les tempêtes le César futur, à son immense destinée. In English: The English having burned Ajaccio, Bonaparte was banished from it forever; with him embarked his brothers, who were all to reign; a frail skiff receives them and carries the future Caesar through the storms to his immense destiny.
Jean-Baptiste Madou, who lived from 1796 to 1877, was the outstanding Belgian lithographer of his generation and later a celebrated painter of genre scenes. His Vie de Napoléon, issued in two volumes at Brussels in 1827 by Marcellin Jobard's Lithographie royale, is among the largest undertakings of his early career, made while lithography was still a young process on the continent.
The caption states the idea on which the whole book is built, that the brothers crowded into this small boat would all come to reign, and the open boat in a heavy sea makes it a striking marine subject. The printing is lithographic, black on wove paper, and the sheet is uncolored.
Condition: Age toning, darker at the edges; handling soiling along the edges and scattered foxing in the margins. Printed image clean.
The oblong format hangs well over a desk or a mantelpiece, and because the plates in the series share the same size and style of lettering, a group bought together reads as a set rather than as an assortment.
This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed. Any framed or interior images are shown for presentation and inspiration only, unless the listing explicitly states that the item is sold framed.
