Sale 213 Lot 161

ACHILLE-JACQUES-JEAN-MARIE DEVERIA (AFTER)
French, 1800 - 1857
Ann Zingha, Queen of Matamba (present-day Angola), early 19th century
Engraving, titled Ann Zingha, Queen of Matamba, is a 19th-century lithograph by François Le Villain based on an earlier illustration by the French artist Achille Deveria. It depicts Queen Nzinga Mbande (c. 1583–1663), the formidable 17th-century monarch of the Ndongo and Matamba kingdoms in present-day Angola, who is celebrated for her lifelong resistance against Portuguese colonial expansion. Deveria’s 1830s rendering was based on a portrait found in a Portuguese convent, reimagining the queen through a European Romantic lens while acknowledging her status as a sovereign. The image captures her in a moment of royal dignity, reflecting her historical reputation as a brilliant military strategist and diplomat who famously asserted her equality with European governors—most notably in the legendary 1622 negotiation where she used a servant as a chair to avoid sitting on the floor before the Portuguese representative. It is neither mounted or framed.
Sheet: 16 x 13.5 inches; image: 12 x 9 inches
$100-120

ARTIST PROFILE: Achille Devéria (1800–1857). Achille-Jacques-Jean-Marie Devéria was a prolific French painter and lithographer who became one of the most significant visual chroniclers of the Romantic era. A student of the neoclassical master Anne-Louis Girodet-Trioson, Devéria eventually transitioned away from traditional historical painting to excel in the burgeoning art of lithography, producing roughly 3,000 prints during his career. His work extended into book illustration for masterpieces like Goethe's Faust, as well as more provocative "libertine" scenes that reflected the shifting social mores of 19th-century France.