The House of Guise, Set of Three Antique French Portraits, circa 1882

This is a set of three original antique hand-colored wood engravings, sold together as one lot, from Augustin Challamel's La France et les Francais a travers les siecles, Paris, circa 1882. The sheets are, in order: Francois de Lorraine, Duke of Guise; Henri de Lorraine, Duke of Guise, Le Balafre; Claude de Lorraine, First Duke of Guise. Francois de Lorraine, duke of Guise, standing in half armor with a ruff, trunk hose and a short cloak, one hand on his hip and the other on his sword, lettered as having died in 1563. Henri de Lorraine, duke of Guise, called the Scarred, standing full length in a close doublet and short cloak with a high ruff, a plumed cap and a rapier, lettered with the date of his murder, 23 December 1588. Claude de Lorraine, first duke of Guise, standing in a fur collared gown over armor with a flat cap and a heavy chain, lettered with his birth in 1496 and his death in 1550, engraved by Petit.

The plate belongs to La France et les Francais a travers les siecles by Augustin Challamel, published in Paris by F. Roy at 185 rue Saint-Antoine about 1882. It comes from the suite headed Costumes civils et militaires des Francais a travers les siecles, which runs through the work and illustrates French civil and military dress from Gaul to the nineteenth century. Much of the original drawing was done by Edmond Lechevalier-Chevignard, working from manuscripts, tapestries and paintings named on the sheets themselves. The plates of this suite are headed Costumes civils et militaires des Francais a travers les siecles across the top of the sheet, numbered at the lower left and signed F. Roy, editeur at the lower right, with the engraver's name cut small into the lower margin of the block on many of them. The ground is left plain so that the figures carry the whole weight of the design.

This is the Guise who retook Calais from the English and was shot before Orleans in 1563, the most successful soldier of his house, and the plate is the central portrait of the three generations the volume illustrates. Guise was stabbed to death in the king's own chamber at Blois on the order of Henri the Third, the most famous political killing in French history before the Revolution, and this is the costume portrait of the man it happened to. They are three original sheets sold together, and the set is never split. Hung together in matching frames the sheets read as one piece of wall rather than as separate prints, and the uniform plate size makes an even line above a sideboard, a bed or a run of stairs.

Light uneven toning, browner toward the edges. Marked handling soiling along the edges of all three sheets. Scattered foxing in the margins of all three sheets. Slight wear at the corners of all three sheets.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed.