Louis de Bourbon, Prince de Condé

Louis de Bourbon, Prince de Condé

Joseph Bowes

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

A three-quarter length portrait wearing armor, a lace collar, and a long curled wig, within a simple oval frame. Louis de Bourbon, Prince of Condé (1621–1686) was a French general and the most famous representative of the Condé branch of the House of Bourbon, known as "le Grand Condé." The print was created to illustrate a "History of France" published in Philadelphia 1796-97.


Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Louis de Bourbon, Prince de CondéLouis de Bourbon, Prince de CondéLouis de Bourbon, Prince de CondéLouis de Bourbon, Prince de CondéLouis de Bourbon, Prince de Condé

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.