The Reasoned Moral Chart of Symbols of the Republic, Founders of Liberty, and Martyrs of Liberty

Johann Andreas Endterische Handlung

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Related to a children’s book about the French Revolution published in 1793, this broadside distills the ideals and heroes, both historic and contemporary, of the new French Republic. Among the allegories of republican values are Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity—evoking the foundational motto—as well as the more radical Jacobin ideologies of Unity and Indivisibility. The presence of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin among the "founders of liberty" highlights the interrelated American and French struggles. The nine "martyrs of liberty" feature men who died on the battlefield, by assassination, or by execution.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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.

Metropolitan Museum of Art