File:The discovery or female Free-Mason (BM 1868,0808.4456).jpg

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The discovery or female Free-Mason   (Wikidata search (Cirrus search) Wikidata query (SPARQL)  Create new Wikidata item based on this file)
Title
The discovery or female Free-Mason
Description
English: Portrait (whole length) of the Chevalier d'Eon, as a woman. He is fashionably dressed, and resembles a good-looking woman of fashion, his head turned slightly to the left showing an elongated pearl ear-ring. He wears a cap over high-dressed hair, a low-cut bodice with ruffled elbow-sleeves. His right hand, on his hip, holds a sword. With his left hand, which holds a cane attached to his wrist by strings, he points left towards a military coat which is spread over a chair. He wears the order of St. Louis and a free-mason's apron. Behind him on the right is a table covered with a cloth hanging in heavy folds; on it is a document, "A Policy 25 P Ct On the Chr D'Eon Man, or Woman," and two uniformly-bound books, "Lettres du Chr D'Eon", "L'Hist. du Chr D'Eon". On the wall behind a military hat and sword hang directly over d'Eon's head. On each side of him is a picture: one (left) represents Mrs. Tofts producing rabbits (see BMSat 1778-86); the other depicts the bottle-imp, seated in a large funnel which is in the neck of a bottle (see BMSat 3022-7). Beneath each picture is the bust of a man; that on the left is Wilkes, an associate of d'Eon, who was accused of trafficking in the insurances on his sex (see BMSat 4870). 25 June 1771
Mezzotint
Depicted people Representation of: Charles de Beaumont, chevalier d'Éon
Date 1771
date QS:P571,+1771-00-00T00:00:00Z/9
Medium paper
Dimensions
Height: 311 millimetres (image only)
Height: 374 millimetres (sheet)
Width: 252 millimetres (image only)
Width: 252 millimetres (sheet)
institution QS:P195,Q6373
Current location
Prints and Drawings
Accession number
1868,0808.4456
Notes

Published on 25 June 1771, this print mocks the Chevalier d'Eon's reception as a Freemason at a London Masonic Lodge and 'unmasks' him as a woman. Wearing an elegant gown, but posed in a typically masculine way, the Chevalier embodies the contradictions of his public persona. The policy document shown on the table behind him refers to the frenzied betting currently taking place on his sex (also satirised in 1886,1221.6 and Y,4.568, among others), while a bust of his friend John Wilkes alludes to rumours that Wilkes and d'Eon were benefitting financially from the policies. He is also accompanied by representations of two of the most notorious hoaxes of the 18th century: the 'bottle imp' (for which, see 1868,0808.3875) and Mary Toft who, in the 1720s, tricked the nation into believing that she had given birth to rabbits (see 1868,0808.3518). The implication is that his change of sex, or concealment of his sex, is a hoax comparable in scale.

For another print referencing d'Eon's reception as a Mason, see 1868,0808.4458.

SV
Source/Photographer https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1868-0808-4456
Permission
(Reusing this file)		 © The Trustees of the British Museum, released as CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

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current04:16, 9 May 2020Thumbnail for version as of 04:16, 9 May 20201,200 × 1,600 (289 KB)Copyfraud (talk | contribs)British Museum public domain uploads (Copyfraud/BM) Satirical prints in the British Museum 1771 #1,485/12,043

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