[Images of nursing mothers in France, 18th and 19th centuries]. / Images de nourrices dans la France des XVIIIe et XIXe siècles

As they became more widely adopted in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century France, wet-nursing and wet-nurses appeared prominently in the iconography of the time. Such images turned negative as criticism against "mercenary breast-feeding" mounted. Over the nineteenth century in particular, wet-nurses were heavily featured in press caricatures: they were being mocked while described as simple-minded, dumb, greedy creatures, with proclivities ranging from a taste for garish attire, to sexual appetites fuelling trysts in public gardens with soldiers on leave. A representative sample of such images will be selected to highlight the codes and values underpinning this mockery.

[Iconography of embryos and fetuses in the treaties of delivery and anatomy from 16th century till 18th century]. / Iconographie des embryons et des foetus dans les traités d'accouchement et d'anatomie du XVIème au XVIIIème siècle.

Leonardo', Eurakius' and Jacob Rueff's carved woods focus attention as they are sketches of foetuses in breech presentation. From the very beginning foetus is a little man made in the image of God in the works of Guillemeau, Mauriceau and Viardel. Later the liking for Baroque made the Putti, embryos with kindly faces created in Padua and Venice. Hunter's treatise finishes this picturesque review.