Abstract The Rodrigues set has no advertising on its illustrations, blank banks, and good condition. A golden sky marks each of these cards. Children act out scenes from La Fontaine's fables, from Florian's "Le Chien Coupable," (5.17), and from someone's "Le Chat et le Moineau." GA is a slightly different approach to the usual French presentation of this fable, perhaps since the actors are children. The music-player here is a young boy, and he has a violin rather than the usual guitar. Part of the...

Abstract These are curious cards. The background is heavily gold with a few emblematic items, like a path and a few trees. The characters are all children highly dressed in adult clothing. Their faces form the focal point of each illustration. A particular curiosity of these portrait-formatted small cards is that the characters' clothing changes from card to card in the six moments of the story. Are we to think that a little troop of players are taking turns at acting out one scene each? The bottom...

Abstract These are curious cards. The background is heavily gold with sparse suggestive scenery, especially ripe fields, storehouse doors, and snow on the ground. The characters are children dressed in adult clothing. Their faces form the focal point of each illustration. A particular curiosity of these portrait-formatted small cards is that the characters seem to change clothing (and faces?) from scene to scene in the five moments of the story pictured here. Are we to think that a little troop of...

Abstract Is there any chance that "L'Huitre et les Plaideurs" belongs to one of the two earlier sets (1883 and 1896) of La Fontaine’s fables in the Liebig series? Might Liebig have sold the plates from its cards for use by others? "Le Lièvre et les Grenouilles" even has the title bar across the top in which "Vero Estratto di Carne Liebig" appears in the 1900 series. The colors have dulled on these cards. They are in fair to good condition.L'Huitre et les PlaideursLe Lièvre et...

Abstract The pictures are monochromatic blue-and-white, with five or six lines per card at the bottom. The text and picture are not coordinated. In the text, for example, Perette is still thinking about cows when the picture already shows the milk fallen. The whole series ends with the line "They call it 'The Pot of Milk.'" This set is identical in picture with a set listed under "Clamaron," which remains the printer. But each card in this set is stamped "Aux Phares de la Bastille: Habillements pour...

Abstract These are smaller-scale reproductions of four of the cards I have labeled as from Bouillon, Rivoyre et Cie. As there, the human scenes are provocative, as when a man of the road speaks with a well-dressed man in DW. One of the more suggestive fable cards I have seen is FC, in which a well dressed man is no doubt flattering a lovely shepherdess. I cannot construe what is happening in "Le Cheval & le Loup" beyond that a smirking young man is kicking a kneeling older man in the face. The...

Abstract These small portrait-formatted cards seem identical with those from Chocolat Poulain Orange except for the omission of all advertising and the change of background color from green to blue. Thus there is near the top of the card a circular illustration in full color. Beneath that is a brown-on-blue design. Two elements finish the downward movement of the card: ten and fourteen lines of the fable, respectively, and, in the bottom right, the numbers 4 and 5. Note that I have numbers 3 and 6...

Abstract These are lovely cards. Each puts children into a landscape. Perhaps the finest is BF, which puts a rather rotund little fellow in military regalia in front of a mirror. By contrast, I am not sure if the world of children fits for portraying the stealing of a donkey! Though all four cards announce "A la Place Clichy" at the top of the picture side, BF and "Les Poissons et le Berger" speak then of an address on the Boulevard des Batignolles as well as three numbered addresses in the Rue...

Abstract UP, "The Angler and the Little Fish"; "The Ass and the Lapdog"; "The Monkey and the Leopard." The most distinguishing feature of these cheaply colored cards lies in the printer's designs flanking both "Fables de La Fontaine" on the top of the card and also a banner at the base of the card. This banner includes the fable's title and one line from the fable. The first three have the French fable text on the verso; "The Monkey and the Leopard" advertises rather Tisane Cisbey for constipation....

Abstract

These cards have an unusual cartoon-like style emphasizing vivid action and strong emotion.

Abstract

The color artistry of these cards is outstanding. They are simply lovely. I would love to figure out for what they were made.

OF

FS

LM

MSA

TH

Cat & Monkey

FC

Heron

OR

WL

Mouse, Cat and Rooster

Abstract

The color artistry of these cards is outstanding. They are simply lovely. I would love to figure out for what they were made.

Abstract

The color artistry of these cards is outstanding. They are simply lovely. I would love to figure out for what they were made.

Abstract This complete set of 84 cards was a special find on a January day when I was passing through Paris. I stopped at a postcard show. As I was leaving, I asked a vendor whom I had not met if she had any fables. She asked "Including complete sets?" I was thrilled to find this set of postcard-sized trade cards, which advertises at the bottom of each text page "Les Gaufrettes Rivoire & Jeandet - Tarare." As it happens, I have a blotter advertising this set of cards. The unusual presentation of...

Abstract Each card quotes four to six lines of La Fontaine's fable at the bottom of the picture side and offers about four images above and alongside separated by swirling floral borders. There is a number before the verse, giving the card's place in a sequential set that must have numbered six to eight cards. Those here are numbered 1, 3, and 4. The first of these pictures the fable's beginning, when one pigeon decides to leave the other for a trip: a pair of pigeons is juxtaposed to a young man and...

Abstract

This card's picture is exactly that on one of the cards from "A la Place Clichy." The text on the verso seems exactly the same, but it is put higher on the card, with two sets of information about "A la Samaritaine" at a 90 degree angle to it. Apparently the store sells novelties in Paris.

Abstract

These are two very pretty cards in good condition. The colors in WL particularly create a 3-D effect. The WL card has no further markings other than the title, and its verso is blank. The card displaying "Le Lièvre et les Grenouilles" gives the full fable text in two columns on the upper half of the verso, and offers a full ad for F. Dupont's new offerings in all genres at the Place d'Armes in Calais.

Le Lièvre et les Grenouilles

WL

TMCM

Abstract These small portrait-formatted cards run a brown framing stripe around a colored illustration. The stripe also frames a few lines from the fable below, sometimes proceeded by the fable's title and sometimes concluding with a reference to La Fontaine and the specific fable. Small italic black print at the top of the illustration gives its French title. Small numerals in the lower right or left may identify a series or a date (e.g., "2 12" and "& 10"). There is also a small signature...

Abstract The cards have the strongest images in this set. They are also my clue to the identity of the papers, which are otherwise unmarked. HC is a curiosity. The card's picture is colorful but sketchy. The witty commentator wears a wide-brimmed hat as he speaks to the kneeling miser. Across the top of the picture is "Demandez la Chicorée extra 'LA SANS RIVALE' chez tous les épiciers." The back is covered with print and a picture of the chicory jar. ELR shows in its "Le Loup devenu Berger" how...

Abstract These cards are doubly curious because they reproduce single cards in the series identified in this collection as "Leopold Verger Small." Thus three cards here pick up one image from that series and add a second image of their own. That is the trick in this presentation: two phases give the story of the fable. The verso of the each card is identical. Death and the Unhappy ManMMThe Coach and the FlyORThe Horse and the Stag...

Abstract These cards have turned out well--and lasted a while--despite the poor stock on which they are printed. The miser image looks to me as though it is strongly influenced by Grandville. The verso offers a wide variety of prizes for the competition and announces that everybody wins. The fact that these three cards are labelled as fables suggests that other literature may have been included in the series. Two of the three cards are inscribed twice each by Marie Therèse Baileau, but she uses the...

Abstract This full set is especially helpful to me because four similar sets are all partial. This group sets the standard at twelve and lists them on the wrapper's back. The multi-colored pictures here have a gray background. The picture-side of the card is without print. The text-side, landscape in orientation like all of the pictures, presents only a title and a text. The paper used is thin, and picture and text have often lost their lamination and have become two pieces of paper. "WMF" appears at...

Abstract

Where the full set of twelve WMF cards is about 2½" x 4", this card is clearly smaller: 2⅜" x 3⅝". The card is numbered as #2 in the series. The front is stamped with "A la Trinité," and the verso has half advertisement and half an excerpt from La Fontaine's verse text. The top of the card may have been cropped.

Abstract

This card is identical with that in the WMF set with these exceptions: it prints "Aus Filles du Calvaire" and "Le Corbeau et le Renard" on the picture side; it uses half the text side for advertising; on the lower half of the text page it gives the fable's title again and just six of its lines. This card is slightly smaller than its equivalent in the WMF set. Though the same image is used, a smaller portion of it is printed.

Abstract After struggling to find eight individual cards, often including some advertising, I was delighted to have the presumably full set of twelve fall into my lap on eBay. This set has no advertising on either side. The scenes I had found are TH, LM, FM, FS, WL, "The Dog and His Master's Lunch," "The Heron," "The Eagle, the Lamb, and the Crow," and "The Rat and the Frog." New are FC, "The Hare and the Frogs," "Two Goats," and "The Dogs, the River, and the Hide." The versos are all blank. The...