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Charlotte Corday
Charlotte Corday
Public domain: Image courtesy of the Worcester Art Museum.

Charlotte Corday

Artist (French, 1762–1817)
Date18th c.
MediumAquatint
DimensionsSheet: 35.8 x 24.8 cm
ClassificationsPrints
Credit LineMrs. Kingsmill Marrs Collection
Object number1926.1415
DescriptionAquatint on white wove paper, with title and biographical info of subject printed below portrait.
Label TextOne of the most infamous figures of the French Revolution, Charlotte Corday assassinated Jean-Paul Marat in 1793. She held the Jacobin journalist solely responsible for the bloody Reign of Terror that paralyzed France, falsely labeling him the chief agent in Louis XVI’s execution. Corday convinced the ailing Marat to provide her an audience in exchange for disclosing names of anti-Jacobin moderates later known as Girondists. Carrying a copy of Plutarch’s Parallel Lives and a six-inch kitchen knife, Corday stabbed Marat while he soothed his blistered, diseased skin in the bathtub.
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