Journée d’étude | Figures of Widows in the 17th and 18th Centuries
This GRHAM study day takes place next month online:
Widows in the 17th and 18th Centuries: Images of Social Status—Accepted, Hidden, Claimed?
Figures de veuves à l’époque moderne (XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles): Images d’un statut social accepté, caché, revendiqué?
Online, 15 June 2021
How did the image of the widowed woman develop during the 17th and 18th centuries? This study day aims to question the identity of widows during the period—famous or unknown—in order to better understand their intellectual, political, and social influence. To register for a Zoom link for the event, please email asso.grham@gmail.com.
P R O G R A M M E
9.00 Accueil des participants
9.15 Introduction — Scarlett BEAUVALET-BOUTOUYRIE (professeure à l’Université de Picardie)
9.45 Pouvoir et rôle politique dans « l’Europe » de l’Ancien Régime
Modération : Maël Tauziède-Espariat (chercheur associé à l’Université de Bourgogne)
• Veuves royales : représentations politiques du veuvage en France et en Angleterre à l’époque moderne (XVIIe–XVIIIe) — Julie ÖZCAN (doctorante en Histoire et Civilisation, l’École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales)
• Christine de France, duchesse et régente de Piémont-Savoie (1619–1663). Entre l’être et le paraître, le statut politique et social d’une veuve Femme d’État — Florine VITAL-DURAND (chercheuse associée à l’Université Grenoble Alpes)
• L’obscur et l’éclat : concilier gouvernement et viduité sous la régence d’Anne d’Autriche — Damien BRIL (chercheur à l’École du Louvre)
11.30 Identité, codes et normes vestimentaires
Modération : Marine Roberton (doctorante à l’Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne)
• Apparences et images des veuves à la cour de France au cœur du XVIIIe siècle. L’exemple des dames de la reine Marie Leszczynska (1725–1768) — Aurélie CHATENET-CALYSTE (maître de conférences en histoire moderne, l’Université Rennes 2)
• Refashioning and Identity in the Mourning Portraits of Katherine Villiers, Duchess of Buckingham — Megan SHAW (PhD Candidate in Art History, The University of Auckland)
12.30 Pause
14.00 Représentations de veuves dans la peinture
Modération : Florence Fesneau, doctorante à l’Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne
• La Vierge-Veuve, un modèle accompli de la viduité ? — Alysée LE DRUILLENEC (doctorante à l’Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne)
• The Virtuous Widow in Late 18th-Century Art — Emma BARKER (Senior Lecturer, The Open University)
15.00 Se distinguer ou perpétuer l’œuvre de l’époux
Modération : Maxime-Georges Métraux (Université Gustave Eiffel / Galerie Hubert Duchemin)
• Derrière la veuve, la maîtresse peintresse ? Être veuve de peintre à Paris aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles — Bruno GUILOIS (chercheur associé au Centre André Chastel, Sorbonne Université)
• Business ‘as Usual’: What We Know of Jane Hogarth, the Printseller — Cristina S. MARTINEZ (Adjunct Professor, University of Ottawa)
16.15 Conclusion, Pierre-Antoine FABRE (Directeur d’études à l’École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales)
New Book | Minerva’s French Sisters
Professor Gelbart will be discussing her book this Thursday, 27 May, at 6pm (ET), in an online session hosted by The Athenaeum of Philadelphia. From Yale UP:
Nina Rattner Gelbart, Minerva’s French Sisters: Women of Science in Enlightenment France (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2021), 360 pages, ISBN: 978-0300252569, $40.
A fascinating collective biography of six female scientists in eighteenth-century France, whose stories were largely written out of history
This book presents the stories of six intrepid Frenchwomen of science in the Enlightenment whose accomplishments—though celebrated in their lifetimes—have been generally omitted from subsequent studies of their period: mathematician and philosopher Elisabeth Ferrand, astronomer Nicole Reine Lepaute, field naturalist Jeanne Barret, garden botanist and illustrator Madeleine Françoise Basseporte, anatomist and inventor Marie-Marguerite Biheron, and chemist Geneviève d’Arconville. By adjusting our lens, we can find them.
In a society where science was not yet an established profession for men, much less women, these six audacious and inspiring figures made their mark on their respective fields of science and on Enlightenment society, as they defied gender expectations and conventional norms. Their boldness and contributions to science were appreciated by such luminaries as Franklin, the philosophes, and many European monarchs. The book is written in an unorthodox style to match the women’s breaking of boundaries.
Nina Rattner Gelbart is professor of history and Anita Johnson Wand Professor of Women’s Studies at Occidental College. Her previous books include Feminine and Opposition Journalism in Old Regime France and The King’s Midwife: A History and Mystery of Madame du Coudray.
C O N T E N T S
Acknowledgments
Chronology
Actors in a Supporting Role
Introduction: A Sextet of Firsts, Variations on a Theme
Interlude: Letter to Elisabeth, Reine, Jeanne, Madeleine Françoise, Marie-Marguerite, and Geneviève
1 Mathematician and Philosopher: The ‘Celebrated Mlle Ferrand’ (1700–1752)
Interlude: Letter to Elisabeth
2 Astronomer and ‘Learned Calculator’: Nicole Reine Lepaute (1723–1788)
Interlude: Letter to Reine
3 Botany in the Field and in the Garden: Jeanne Baret (1740–1807) and Madeleine Françoise Basseporte (1701–1780)
Interlude: Letters to Jeanne and Madeleine Françoise
4 Anatomist and Inventor: Marie-Marguerite Biheron and Her Medical Museum (1719–1795)
Interlude: Letter to Marie-Marguerite
5 Chemist and Experimentalist: Marie Geneviève Charlotte Thiroux d’Arconville and Her Choice of Anonymity (1720–1805)
Interlude: Letter to Geneviève
Epilogue
Notes
Index
Enfilade 
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