Close-ups
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.
The Bridge of Lodi, Napoleon's Close Column, Antique Madou Lithograph, 1827
£190
$250 · €225
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. Light wear to the bottom left and bottom right corners; minor nicks to the right edge. Age toning, darker at the edges; handling soiling along the edges and scattered foxing in the margins. A small light fleck in the image, otherwise clean.
- Collection
- Battle scenes
- Era
- 1790 to 1815, Napoleonic wars
- Stock no.
- BG-14174-3-10
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 action at the bridge of Lodi, from Vie de Napoléon, published at Brussels in 1827. The sheet is lettered PONT DE LODI in capitals above the image and numbered 5 at the lower right. Bonaparte confers with a group of officers beside a ruined brick building wreathed in smoke, while a mounted officer in a plumed hat looks out toward the river, where a column crowds across the long bridge at the right beside an abandoned gun.
The printed caption below the image reads: Dix mille hommes et trente pièces de canons gardaient ce pont; Bonaparte forme son armée en colonne serrée, et sans tirer un seul coup de fusil, cette masse traverse le pont, et remporte la victoire en moins de tems qu'il n'en faut pour décrire le combat. In English: Ten thousand men and thirty cannon guarded this bridge; Bonaparte forms his army in close column, and without firing a single shot this mass crosses the bridge and wins the victory in less time than it takes to describe the fight.
Vie de Napoléon appeared at Brussels in 1827, in two volumes, from the Lithographie royale de Jobard. Its title describes a text written by a society of men of letters from the new documents dictated and corrected at Saint Helena by Napoleon himself, and its lithographs are credited to Jean-Baptiste Madou (1796 to 1877), then at the start of a long career as Belgium's leading genre painter.
Lodi, on 10 May 1796, is the action Napoleon later said first made him believe he was more than an ordinary 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: Light wear to the bottom left and bottom right corners; minor nicks to the right edge. Age toning, darker at the edges; handling soiling along the edges and scattered foxing in the margins. A small light fleck in the image, otherwise clean.
A single sheet frames well in a plain dark molding with a wide off white mat, and three or four plates from the series hung together make a coherent wall for a study, a library or a hallway.
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.
