1808 Picquet First Empire Case City Plan or Map of Paris, France

This stunning large-format folding 1808 Charles Picquet case map of Paris presents the city during the heady years of the Napoleonic era. Depicting the city from the newly-constructed Pont d'Jena (now the Pont d'Iéna) and the Champs de Mars to the Place du Trône and from Montmartre (then a small hamlet outside Paris) to the Porte d'Italie, the splendor and luxury of Napoleon's imperial capital are on full display.

Paris under the First Empire

Many sites that modern visitors will recognize, such as the Louvre, the Jardin des Tuileries, and Notre Dame are illustrated, as are the Place Vendôme and the Place de la Concorde, which only a few years earlier was bathed in blood by the French Revolution and their famous guillotine. Other sites immediately render apparent the contemporary political climate in Paris. For example, the Tuileries Palace is labeled as the Palais Impérial ou des Tuileries, and Les Invalides, famous for its gold dome, is known as the Hôtel Impérial des Invalides. Today's Quai d'Orsay, where millions visit the Musée d'Orsay every year, is labeled here as the Quai Bonaparte. Today's Place de l'Étoile is labeled here as the Étoile des Champs Elysées and is where Napoleon's Arc de Triomphe was being built to celebrate his victory at the Battle of Austerliz.

The Remarkable Piquet Family

The Picquet's were remarkable in their tenacity with which they maintained and grew their government sponsored publishing contracts throughout the French Revolution, the Napoleonic Era, and the Bourbon Restoration. Early editions were dedicated to Joachim Murat, Marshal of the Empire and brother-in-law to the Emperor Napoleon I. After the fall of Napoleon, Picquet reworked the dedication to honor the Duc D'Orleans and the King of France, at the time Louis Philippe I.

Publication History and Census

This map was created, engraved, and published by Charles Picquet in 1808. Six examples are catalogued in the OCLC and are part of the institutional collections at the Hagley Museum and Library in Wilmington, Delaware; the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library in Toronto, Ontario, Canada; the University of Chicago; the Bibliothèque nationale de France in Paris, France; the Institut national d'histoire de l'art also in Paris; and the Bibliothèque nationale et universitaire in Strasbourg, France.