Standbeeld van een man gezeten op een zitbank 1631 - 1637

This is Claude Mellan’s engraving of a seated man, made sometime in the 17th century. Look at the statue: the subject’s toga and sandals mark him as Roman, while his bald head and stern expression suggest a Republican senator, perhaps even Cato the Younger. France in the 1600s was a society deeply concerned with its relationship to the classical world, often seeing itself as the new Rome. Mellan worked as a draughtsman for antiquarians, so would have been closely linked to this. Aristocratic society and the court of Louis XIV would have viewed images of Roman virtue as mirrors to their own ideals. Of course, the reality of French society was far from the Republican ideal. This print and others like it would have helped the elite to imagine themselves as part of a noble tradition, bolstering their power. Historians can unpack these images by consulting a wide range of period sources, from fashion guides to political pamphlets, to understand the complex social negotiations that underpin even seemingly simple artworks.