Harris Schrank Fine Prints

Honore Daumier (1808-1879), TRS HAUTS ET TRS PUISSANS MOUTARDS ET MOUTARDES LGITIMES, lithograph, 1834. References: Daumier Register 132, Delteil 132. Only state. Published by L’Association Mensuelle. [With extensive annotation including Daumier’s initials in the plate; see below] With margins, 13 5/8 x 19 1/2, the sheet 14 1/8 x 21 inches. Now restored,with numerous (flattened) folds, repaired tears and nicksin the margins mostly where previously folded, evidence of prior foxing verso (now de-acidified); archival mounting with window mat.

A very good impression of this extremely rare, early, andpolitically important lithograph.

This lithograph was published as part of the special L’Association Mensuelle series, to provide fundsto pay for legalexpenses incurred by the journal Caricaturein its battles with the French government. Many of Daumier’s most famous and rarest lithographs were published within this series. The prints are larger than those in the journals, and are apt to have been folded (as is this one) since they were large, and typically hidden by the recipients.

Tre Haut et Tre Puissans is thought to depict the children of Louis-Phillipe, although the commentator Provost felt it illustrated the future leaders of Austria, France and Greece as well as the young Queen Victoria. The indispensable Daumier Register gives us a substantial amount of background on this print, and also provides thistranslation of the text at the bottom of the print:

TRS HAUTS ET TRS PUISSANS MOUTARDS ET MOUTARDES LGITIMES.
Peuples, battez vous, dchirez vous, gorgez vous, pour ces Augustes personnages, vous leur appartenez imbcilles.

Translation:

Peoples, defend yourselves, tear yourselves to pieces, sacrifice yourselves for these royals, you belong to them, imbeciles.

$3000