Meissonier won critical acclaim and commercial success with his scrupulously detailed battle and genre scenes. Dressing his models in period costumes from his own collection and surrounding them with historical props, he earned a reputation for exacting historical research. The tightness and precision of his technique—note the absence of visible brushstrokes in even this tiny composition—contribute to the impression his works create of factuality. Contemporaries regarded Meissonier’s pictures as the next best thing to photographs of a pre-photographic past.

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