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Framed and on the wall
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Siege of Toulon, Bonaparte's Artillery, Antique Madou Lithograph, 1827
£185
$245 · €220
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
- Sieges & fortresses
- Era
- 1790 to 1815, Napoleonic wars
- Stock no.
- BG-14174-3-4
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 Bonaparte at the siege of Toulon, from Vie de Napoléon, published at Brussels in 1827. The sheet is lettered SIÉGE DE TOULON in capitals above the image and numbered 3 at the lower left. A group of senior officers in plumed hats stands on a hillside while the young Bonaparte, at the right, points out across the ground toward a fort flying a flag; a kneeling soldier with his pack on his back spreads a plan on the ground at his feet, and a gun crew works a field piece on the slope at the left.
The printed caption below the image reads: Bonaparte ayant été chargé de la direction de l'artillerie au siége de Toulon, rectifie les erreurs qui avaient été commises avant lui, et se montre supérieur à ceux même auxquels il était inférieur en grade. In English: Bonaparte, having been given charge of the artillery at the siege of Toulon, corrects the errors made before him, and shows himself superior even to those he was inferior to in rank.
Vie de Napoléon was published at Brussels in 1827 in two volumes by the Lithographie royale de Jobard, the press of Marcellin Jobard, with a text written by a society of men of letters from the new documents dictated and corrected by Napoleon himself at Saint Helena. Its lithographs are credited to Jean-Baptiste Madou (1796 to 1877), who later became the best known Belgian genre painter of his generation.
Toulon in 1793 is where the career begins. The port had gone over to the royalists and admitted the British fleet, and the twenty four year old artillery captain's plan for the guns that drove the fleet out of the harbor won him promotion to brigadier general. It is a crayon lithograph printed in black, uncolored as issued, with the lettered title above the image and the caption in script below.
Condition: Age toning, darker at the edges; handling soiling along the edges and scattered foxing in the margins. Printed image clean.
Hung at eye level where the caption can be read, the plate makes a natural gift for a reader of Napoleonic history or a collector of early lithography.
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.
