The Bearer of Bad Tidings (from Le Monde Illustré) 

This is an engraving after a painting by the French artist Jean Lecomte du Nouÿ, made for 'Le Monde Illustré', a popular illustrated news magazine in nineteenth-century France. The image depicts a scene of death and intrigue, set in what the artist imagines as ancient Egypt. Orientalist fantasies like this one were extremely popular at the time. They offered a vision of a distant, exotic, and brutal world, reinforcing ideas about European superiority and the right to colonize. The setting is an architectural mishmash of ancient Egyptian motifs that would have been familiar to French audiences, thanks to archaeological discoveries and the display of Egyptian antiquities in museums. To understand this image better, we might research French colonial history, the development of Egyptology as a discipline, and the role of popular magazines in shaping public opinion. What we learn might challenge its Orientalist depiction.