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To view any of our past lectures please visit our YouTube channel.
To view any of our past lectures please visit our YouTube channel.
The Sun King (1638-1715) and his councilors considered his medals as the summit of his propaganda. The reason is simple: they thought that like Roman coins, they would last more than other media to eternize the royal memory. More than 300 were coined to celebrate the great events of the reign and a luxurious folio book was printed by the Royal Press (two editions, 1702 and 1723, the lecturer being happy to own a duplicate copy of king George III, 1702, which he might bring and show provided there should not be custom problems). A group of around ten scholars, writers and artists, known as the Small Academy, were in charge of looking after the medals and the book. From 1694 to 1702 they gathered twice a week in the palace of the Louvre dealing only with this subject. The proceedings of their meetings are preserved in the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres. The aim of this lecture is to present the Small Academy, the medals and the book. Most medals were inspired by Imperial Roman coins. Some of them deal with events in relation with England (which produced satirical medals as an answer). A set of the medals is owned by the British Museum and another one by the Duke of Northumberland. Presently the best specialists of the subject are English: Sir Mark Jones FSA for the medals, Professor James Mosley (Reading University) for the book. The lecturer directed two volumes on the subject (Presses Universitaires de Rouen et du Havre, 2016 and 2023) in which they participated.
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