Funerary Monument of Jacques-Auguste de Thou
Francois Anguier and Barthelemy Prieur (1604-1669 and c. 1536-1611) · Before 1647
Three figures kneel in prayer, the parliamentarian and historian Jacques-Auguste de Thou at his prie-dieu, flanked by his two wives, one of whom has a small dog curled at her knees. Below them, two muscular figures frame a black sarcophagus with a bronze relief. De Thou, who lived from 1553 to 1617, is shown in his robes, an elderly man of learning. Look for the difference of hand: the figure of the first wife, Marie de Barbancon-Cani, was carved by Barthelemy Prieur after her death in 1601, in the drier style of the late Renaissance, whereas the historian and his second wife, Gasparde de La Chatre, are the work of Francois Anguier, whose looser, more Roman manner belongs to the following generation.
De Thou was president of the Parliament of Paris, keeper of the King's Library from 1593, and author of a monumental history of the Wars of Religion. His tomb, completed in 1647, filled the family chapel in the church of Saint-Andre-des-Arts in Paris with an ambitious architectural setting into which the praying figures were fitted. Seized at the Revolution, the surviving elements reached the Louvre in 1851 and 1894.
Did You Know? Two sculptors separated by half a century worked on the same tomb, so the first wife looks noticeably older in style than her husband.
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