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Old 11-May-17, 17:38
al89 al89 is offline
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Default Re: Dominant female aristocrats / women rulers defeating men rulers

On the subject of aristocratic women in French revolution there is also Charlotte de Corday who killed Jacobin revolutionary Marat.

In 1847, writer Alphonse de Lamartine gave Corday the posthumous nickname l'ange de l'assassinat (the Angel of Assassination).

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Marat had played a substantial role in the political purge of the Girondins, with whom Corday sympathized. His murder was memorialized in the painting The Death of Marat by Jacques-Louis David, which shows Marat's dead body after Corday stabbed him in his medicinal bath.

From Wiki article:

Initially, she planned to assassinate Marat in front of the entire National Convention, intending to make an example out of him, but upon arriving in Paris she discovered that Marat no longer attended meetings because his health was deteriorating due to a skin disorder, dermatitis herpetiformis. She was then forced to change her plan. She went to Marat's home before noon on 13 July, claiming to have knowledge of a planned Girondist uprising in Caen; she was turned away by his wife, Simonne Evrard. On her return that evening, Marat admitted her. At the time, he conducted most of his affairs from a bathtub because of his skin condition. Marat wrote down the names of the Girondists that she gave to him, and she then pulled out the knife and plunged it into his chest. He called out, Aidez-moi, ma chère amie! ("Help me, my dear friend!") and died.

This is the moment memorialized by Jacques-Louis David's painting [attachment 1]. The iconic pose of Marat dead in his bath has been reviewed from a different angle in Baudry's posthumous painting of 1860 [attachment 2], both literally and interpretatively: Corday, rather than Marat, has been made the hero of the action.


Interesting how there are so many depictions of her assassination of Marat, it reminds me of the renaissance Power of Women theme.
Attached Images
File Type: jpg Jacques-Louis_David_-_Marat_assassinated_-_Google_Art_Project_2.jpg (83.0 KB, 34 views)
File Type: jpg Charlotte_Corday.jpg (63.8 KB, 72 views)

Last edited by al89; 11-May-17 at 17:45.
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