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II. Qianlong : dons, tributs et séductions commerciales

Henri Bertin and Louis XV’s Gifts to the Qianlong Emperor

John Finlay
p. 93-112

Résumés

Henri Bertin et les présents de Louis XV à l’empereur Qianlong
En 1764, Henri Bertin, ministre d’État de Louis XV, procure des instructions au sujet des arts et manufactures français à deux chrétiens chinois, Aloys Ko et Étienne Yang, afin qu’à leur retour ils soient capables de faire des rapports sur les pratiques et techniques chinoises. Prenant la mer en 1765, Ko et Yang emportèrent un ensemble de « présents » – des cadeaux fournis à Bertin par le roi. Ces présents devinrent toutefois l’objet de négociations entre les représentants impériaux, l’empereur et les jésuites français à la cour des Qing. Cet épisode éclaire le rôle des présents diplomatiques en tant que médiateurs politiques et culturels entre deux grandes nations.

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  • 1 Silvestre de Sacy 1970: 164-165.

1For many in France—as in much of Europe in the eighteenth century—China was envisioned as an ancient, enlightened nation, ruled by an educated and benevolent emperor surrounded by scholar-officials. The ideal image of China served as a kind of mirror in which to examine what was good, or what was lacking, in Europe. Henri Léonard Bertin (1720-92), a minister of state from 1763 to 1780 under Louis XV and, briefly, Louis XVI, believed that France had much to learn from China in the domains of what he and others referred to as “the arts and sciences.” Taking advantage of a unique set of circumstances, the King, Louis XV, and Bertin sent an extraordinary selection of gifts—specifically called présents—to China with the goal of establishing equal, mutual exchanges between the two great nations. In the context of the gifts, which were ultimately presented to the emperor of China, Bertin stated his firm conviction that France and China are directly comparable—a position shared by others of the period—and that they could be compared as civilizations on an equal footing. The ship bearing the gifts left France on 1 February 1765 and arrived at Canton (the port city of Guangzhou) on 29 July.1

Ko and Yang and their Instruction in France

  • 2 There are a number of variants of the names Ko and Yang, and birthdates cited for the two men are (...)
  • 3 The Compagnie des Indes was only briefly attached to Bertin’s ministry from 1763 to 1764, as cited (...)
  • 4 For the date of Ko and Yang’s request, see also Silvestre de Sacy 1970: 160. The incomplete, 12-pa (...)
  • 5 Transcriptions of French texts follow the spelling and punctuation of the original; all translatio (...)
  • 6 This phase of Ko and Yang’s instruction is described in Bernard-Maître 1949: 151-197.

2Toward the end of January 1764, two Chinese Christians, Aloys Ko and Étienne Yang,2 who had been ordained as Roman Catholic priests after some 14 years of residence and study in France, applied to Henri Bertin for passage back to China on a ship of the French East India Company.3 The date appears in a text entitled Voyage et Séjour en France par Ordre du Roi de Deux Particuliers Chinois, les Sieurs Kô & Yang, a small publication that would have detailed the story of their experiences in France.4 According to Ko and Yang: “M.gr Bertin, Ministre & Secrétaire d’État, prévenu en notre faveur, a voulu nous rendre utiles à la France & en même temps à la Chine: en conséquence nous avons été engagés à différer notre voyage à un an.”5 Louis XV, surely on the recommendation of Bertin, ordered that Ko and Yang should visit various royal manufactories, the official studios and workshops in Paris and the provinces which produced goods for the royal court and the French state. Here they would learn what differences there might be between the arts of France and China.6 What were called les arts, however, were practical or mechanical skills, and the term almost never referred to the fine arts when used in reference to China. The goal was to prepare Ko and Yang to send detailed reports back from China on such things as manufacturing, agriculture, the production of silk and porcelain, printing, craft techniques, and even bridges and canals—reports from which France could benefit. And their brief education in selected technologies was in many ways directly related to the selection of gifts they would take back to China.

  • 7 Mémoires 1776: vol. I, Préface, iii; much of the Preface is taken up with the story of Ko and Yang (...)
  • 8 Mémoires 1776: vol. I, Préface, iii: “[…] the drawing of a machine, of a loom, of an instrument, o (...)
  • 9 The prints and drawings are bound into the beginning of Bib. Inst. MS 1520: f. 8-13.
  • 10 The source for the Gengzhi tu images would be a late seventeenth–century edition of the album. See (...)

3In addition to their technical training, Ko and Yang were also provided with instruction in the arts of drawing and etching. Bertin maintained in the preface to the first volume of the Mémoires concernant les Chinois—the series of publications on China that he sponsored beginning in 1776—that training in drawing and etching was an integral part of Ko and Yang’s preparation and would make it possible to provide illustrations that could complement what words alone did not completely describe.7 The images that Ko and Yang could send from China—drawings, paintings, or prints—would be crucial to the communication of accurate information. But it is not clear why they should study etching, which requires a well-equipped studio, including a large, specialized printing press and European-style paper in order to produce a satisfactory image. Although Bertin had hoped that “. . . le dessein d’une machine, d’un métier d’étoffe, d’un instrument, d’une plante, devoit suppléer ce qui manque aux descriptions les plus détaillées, & les surpasser infiniment,”8 the extant examples of Ko and Yang’s etchings and drawings from the time of their instruction in 1764 are copies of other prints or drawings, not objects or views directly observed.9 None of them are technical illustrations; two sketches signed “Mr. Yang” copy botanical illustrations, three pencil drawings signed “Mr. Kao” reproduce what are apparently popular Dutch landscape prints, and unsigned etchings based on the Chinese album of woodblock prints entitled the Imperially Commissioned Illustrations of Agriculture and Sericulture (Yuzhi Gengzhi tu) combine elements of two prints into one scene.10

  • 11 The text is found in Bib. Inst. MS 1520: f. 23-33; it is transcribed in Bernard-Maître 1949: 167-1 (...)
  • 12 Bernard-Maître 1949: 160. For the Imprimerie royale, which functioned from 1640 to 1797, see Berna (...)
  • 13 The “Remarks on different manufactures” are found in Bib. Inst. MS 1520: f. 40-47; see Bernard-Maî (...)

4Characteristically, Bertin laid out in great detail what he wanted Ko and Yang to observe and where they would travel in pursuit of their technical and scientific education. Bertin wrote two texts of instructions, which he entitled “Mémoires.” The Mémoire on Ko and Yang’s study of royal manufactories in or near Paris apparently does not survive. The other document, on what they should study in the provinces, is entitled “Mémoire sur ce que les chinois doivent voir en France avant retournée [sic] en Chine.”11 Their practical training began with visits to the royal tapestry workshops of the Manufacture des Gobelins and included tours of the carpet manufactory of Savonnerie, of the porcelain manufactory at Sèvres, and the Imprimerie Royale du Louvre, the printing presses located within the French royal palace.12 Their subsequent reports to Bertin, entitled “Remarques sur différentes manufactures,” contain meticulous notes on what they learned, and these were accompanied by their “Réflections” on what they observed.13 French practice is often contrasted with the comparable art or technology in China. Ko and Yang’s remarks on the Gobelins tapestry manufactory typically reveal the basic knowledge they have acquired in France—as well as their very limited knowledge of conditions in China. On the tapestries they wrote:

  • 14 “Two or three tapestries from this country in the palace of the Emperor would perhaps give him mor (...)

Deux ou trois tentures des tapisseries de ce pays-ci dans le palais de l’Empereur lui ferait peut-être plus de plaisir que tous les trônes magnifiques dont il orne sa cour. Il serait surpris de l’éclat des couleurs et de la beauté du dessin. Les personnages et les fleurs sont préférables à toute autre représentation, mais il faut que les personnages soient décents, parce que les Chinois sont sur cela extrêmement délicats.14

5Ko and Yang, however, would have been in no position to judge the interiors of the Qing imperial palaces. But their suggestion that French tapestries would be a fitting gift for the emperor raises the question of the remarkable gift of a set of six tapestries from the manufactory at Beauvais that would be sent to China and ultimately presented to the Qianlong Emperor.

The Présents from France for the Emperor of China

  • 15 For Bertin’s complete “Instruction,” see Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 60-71; for the list, see f. 62, wh (...)

6A long letter from Bertin, dated 16 January 1765, details his “Instruction pour Mr. Ko et Mr. Yang” on what they should do on their return to China. The letter contains a list of some of the gifts that the King of France had ordered to be delivered to Ko and Yang to take back to their homeland. Other sources, including the pages of the Voyage et Séjour, identify additional gifts, although there is no one single, complete inventory from the period, and later publications apparently do not contain a comprehensive list.15 The list below is as complete as possible. The gifts included:

Une Tenture des six Tapisseries des Chinois (A set of six tapestries of the Chinese). The tapestries are surely the most important of the gifts, and they are discussed below in detail.

  • 16 Bernard-Maître 1949: 184, n. 103, cites Bib. Inst. MS 1526: f. 118 verso, for the payment of 262 l (...)

Deux portraits par Vigée, avec glaces et bordures (Two portraits by Vigée, with glass and frames). These are portraits painted by Louis Vigée (1715-67), but their subjects remain unknown.16

  • 17 The traditional French pouce measured approxi­mately 2.7 cm; thus these large panes would have mea (...)
  • 18 Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 11 verso-12 verso; see also the notes added in the margins of this document

Une caisse de douze glaces de 30 sur 24 pouces (A case of twelve panes of glass, 30 by 24 pouces).17 There was some confusion on this gift: Ko and Yang thought that they were mirrors, but Bertin had ordered glass sent to China to be silvered there, since he understood that this process was accomplished much better by the Chinese.18

  • 19 The list of Sèvres porcelains appears in Roi 1964: 29-43; see esp. 33 and n. 4, which cites the Ar (...)
  • 20 On the Sèvres porcelains, see Rochebrune 2019.

Un ensemble de porcelaine de Sèvres (A selection of Sèvres porcelain).19 The gift of porcelains included a total of eighteen objects, including vases, pot-pourris, and a number of figures after designs by François Boucher (1703-1770) and Jean-Baptiste Oudry (1686-1755). These distinctive French porcelains were second in importance among the gifts only to the tapestries.20

  • 21 Dehergne 1964: 372-397; see esp. 384, n. 46. Dehergne describes it as garnie de ses ustensiles et (...)

Une imprimerie portative, “garnie de tous ses utensiles et de quatre caisses de caractères français” (A portable printing press “with all of its equipment and four cases of French type”).21 Printing was one of the fields in which Ko and Yang had received technical instruction, and Chinese printing was a subject of some interest in Europe.

  • 22 Bernard-Maître 1949: 184, n. 107, refers to the previous citation in his own article on 166, n. 52 (...)

La machine d’électricité de Brisson (Brisson’s electrical apparatus). Mathurin-Jacques Brisson (1723-1806), a member of the Académie Royale des Sciences, was responsible for part of Ko and Yang’s training in the sciences. In a letter to Bertin dated 7 September 1764, Brisson noted that the small electric generator was ready with all the necessary equipment for electrical experiments. He is most likely referring to an electrostatic mechanism called a Leyden Jar.22

Une collection de lunettes d’approche (A collection of spyglasses).

Un télescope (A telescope).

Une chambre noire (A camera obscura). This is an optical drawing device, a box mounted with a lens and mirror that projected an image onto a sheet of paper inside the darkened box. The person using the box would then trace the image for an accurate drawing.

Un microscope solaire (A solar microscope). A microscope where the specimen is illuminated by sunlight reflected off a mirror.

  • 23 This type of microscope consisted of parts attached together by a screw mechanism, one of which he (...)

Un microscope à liqueur (A hand-held microscope). Another, simpler type of microscope where the specimen was either mounted on a small plate or suspended in a drop of liquid.23

  • 24 Bernard-Maître 1949: 183 and n. 100: “deux montres en or de chez Balthazar [à Paris] valant chacun (...)

Deux montres d’or (Two gold watches). These impressive gold watches are noted in an addition in the margin of Bertin’s letter of 16 January 1765.24

  • 25 Bib. Inst. MS 1526: f. 118, notes a payment “à Saillant Libraire pour 23 Cahiers des arts.” For Sa (...)

A selection of twenty-three booklets on the arts from the bookseller Saillant. The bookseller Charles Saillant (1716-1786) was one of the publishers of the extended series of illustrated volumes entitled Descriptions des arts et métiers…, authored or sponsored by the Royal Academy of Sciences, between 1761 and 1789.25

  • 26 Bib. Inst. MS 1526: f. 118; there is only a simple statement: “au S. Vallat libraire pour fournitu (...)

Books from the bookseller Vallat.26 At present, there appear to be no further extant references to the titles from the printer and bookseller Pierre Vallat-la-Chapelle (d. 1772).

  • 27 Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 71 verso.

Cartes géographiques…, plans de Paris, du Louvre, de Versailles et des autres maisons royales donneront une idée de la magnificence du Roy (Geographical maps…, plans of Paris, the Louvre, Versailles and other royal residences [which] will give an idea of the magnificence of the King).27 These are noted in Bertin’s “Instruction,” and they are discussed briefly below.

7Nevertheless, the gifts placed in Ko and Yang’s care were not originally for presentation directly to the Emperor, something Bertin himself made clear in his “Instruction,” where he explains how the royal gifts from France were intended to be used. The original manuscript, written perhaps by one of Bertin’s secretaries, contains an additional note in Bertin’s distinctive handwriting down toward the bottom of the page:

Les présents qu’on a fait en France au Sr. Ko et au Sr. Yang sont d’une espèce dont ils retireroient pas d’utilité personnelle, si l’on n’avoit envisagé que ces présents placés convenablement et à propos distribués avec une connoissance particulière des personnes, mandarins ou seigneurs à qui ils seront donnés pourront leur acquérir de l’estime et la considération et de grandes facilités dans leurs recherches…

  • 28 “The gifts that were made in France to Mr. Ko and to Mr. Yang are of a kind from which they would (...)

[note in Bertin’s handwriting:] Et autant qu’ils le pourront dans des occasions et à des personnes telles qu’on puisse espérer par là de faire naitre le goût des arts de la France à la Chine.28

8That is, these gifts are of themselves not things that would be personally useful to Ko and Yang, but Bertin envisioned that they should be presented to carefully chosen individuals from whom Ko and Yang might receive official support in their research. And they were specifically intended to inspire an interest in China about the arts of France.

  • 29 Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 62 verso.
  • 30 Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 70 verso.
  • 31 Ko and Yang expressed their gratitude to Bertin and the King of France in the Voyage et Séjour, bu (...)

9To this same document, Bertin’s “Instruction” of 16  January 1765 to Ko and Yang with its abbreviated list of the royal gifts, Bertin made another long annotation in his own handwriting. He again repeated that it would be most beneficial for both France and China if the Emperor, the nobles of the court, and the nation should develop a taste for the arts of France. This is a critical goal that Ko and Yang should never lose sight of, and, in future, they will be sent descriptions of French products and detailed price lists for tapestries as well as for porcelains and pieces of glass.29 In all cases, they are to report back to Bertin on exactly how the gifts have been distributed and to whom.30 At the end of the Voyage et Séjour text, Ko and Yang agreed that they would follow the instructions of the King as conveyed to them by his minister Bertin.31

The Tapestries of the Second Tenture Chinoise

  • 32 For a detailed discussion of the second Tenture Chinoise along with Ko and Yang’s role in taking t (...)
  • 33 Bernard-Maître 1950: 5, “6 pièces des Chinois, livrées à M. Bertin pour envoyer en Chine”; see n.  (...)
  • 34 Badin 1909: 36; Badin refers to a “scholar” who has traced the history of Bertin’s set and their r (...)

10In 1742, at the Salon du Louvre, François Boucher, a distinguished member of the Académie de Peinture et de Sculpture and well-known for his tapestry designs, exhibited eight oil “sketches,” of which six would be reproduced by Jean-Joseph Dumons (1687-1779) as cartoons, that is, the full-scale models for weaving the tapestries known as the second Tenture Chinoise.32 The registers of the royal manufactory of Beauvais contain an entry dated 11 March 1763, noting “six examples of the Chinese [set], delivered to M. Bertin, to send to China,” and the set of the six tapestries would be the most remarkable of the royal gifts.33 Indeed, it is evident that the order for the tapestries was made well before Ko and Yang’s suggestion that the emperor of China would appreciate tapestries from France, clearly indicating that the presentation of a set of tapestries, possibly conceived of as gifts to the Qianlong Emperor, had been planned in some form before Bertin was able to take advantage of Ko and Yang’s request for a return voyage to their homeland. It was, in fact, the regular practice each year for the king to order a set of five or six tapestries to be delivered to the ministry of foreign affairs for presentation to the various courts of Europe, and it appears that here China was to be the beneficiary of this crucial sign of French royal favour.34

  • 35 For a recent discussion of the tapestries, which places them in international, inter-cultural, and (...)
  • 36 Rado 2017: 122; and see the listing with images for the designs on the website of the Musée des Be (...)
  • 37 The tapestry of “La Foire chinoise” is discussed again below.

11The subjects of the designs—idealized, fantastic chinoiserie views of China—would at first seem to be a curious gift to present to the Emperor, but their scale and magnificence signalled the well-established role of tapestries as gifts from the kings of France.35 The subjects of the six tapestries chosen to send to China included the “Festin de l’empereur de Chine” (also referred to as “Le Repas chinois”), “La Chasse chinoise,” “La Danse chinoise,” “La Foire chinoise,” “La Pêche chinoise,” and “Le Jardin chinois” (also referred to as “La Toilette chinoise”).36 Among the designs, Boucher’s painting entitled “La Foire chinoise” (fig. E1) shows a scene of a marketplace with two figures on a stage—performing or perhaps hawking their wares—along with a woman in a wheeled chair shaded by a large parasol and pushed by a servant, various figures in elegant costumes examining goods, a view of a city gate or an archway (modelled on a Chinese structure called a pailou), and a distant pagoda.37 Two of Boucher’s sketches, “Le Mariage chinois” and “L’Audience de l’empereur de Chine”—both of which depict the figure of the emperor—were not included in the final selection of six compositions to be reproduced as full-scale tapestries. This raises a possible question of whether depictions of the emperor were specifically avoided, although the “Festin de l’empereur” (or the “Repas chinois”) did include a figure with a headdress and robes that identify the supposed emperor of China in the tapestries.

Fig. E1. François Boucher (1703–1770), sketch for “La Foire chinoise”

Fig. E1. François Boucher (1703–1770), sketch for “La Foire chinoise”

Oil on canvas, 1742 (41 x 65 cm). © Musée des beaux-arts et d’archéologie de Besançon (D.843.1.9)/Photo P. Guenat.

  • 38 A significant part of Bertin’s correspondence with the Jesuit missionaries is reprinted in eight s (...)
  • 39 Cordier 1917: 295-299. The tapestries are first discussed in this letter; the discussion continues (...)
  • 40 Cordier 1917: 303-304. For Zongdu, the Governor-General’s title, see Hucker 1985: no. 7158, tsung- (...)

12In the “Instruction” of 16 January 1765 to Ko and Yang, Bertin had anticipated the difficulties in shipping the complete set of gifts from Canton to Beijing. Bertin’s knowledge of the China trade is reflected in these concerns, but he could not have guessed at the complications that the gifts, especially the tapestries, would provoke when they first reached China. The story of the tapestries after their arrival in China is documented in the letters exchanged between Bertin and Father Michel Benoist (1715-74), the Superior of the Jesuit mission in Beijing.38 Benoist served the Qianlong Emperor as an artist, mathematician, and as the hydraulic engineer who had designed and supervised the fountains for the Emperor’s European Palaces of the Yuanmingyuan. In a letter dated 12 October 1766, Benoist informed Bertin that Ko and Yang had arrived at the Jesuit residence in Beijing at the end of January but that they faced real challenges in carrying out the projects that Bertin had prepared them for.39 The possession of the very valuable gifts they brought with them would immediately raise suspicions among government officials. In fact, as Benoist wrote in this same letter, Bertin had already been informed that on their arrival in China the gifts from France were seized by customs officials and that the Governor-General of Guangdong refused to allow them to be sent to Beijing.40

  • 41 Cordier 1917: 307. Such actions would also help preserve Ko and Yang’s anonymity and safety.
  • 42 Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 10rv.

13This was the latest incident related to an official Qing policy which, since 1760, had restricted all contacts between the missionaries in Beijing and Canton, including the delivery of letters, books, and other goods sent from Europe as well as the travels of any new members for the French mission. Members of the Council of French Compagnie des Indes (who happened to be in Canton for part of this period) determined that the best course would be for the French missionaries to present the tapestries to the Emperor. A long and complex negotiation was thus begun along with plans about how they might be sent to Beijing. Benoist also reported that Ko and Yang, fully aware of the dangers they faced as Chinese Christians returning from abroad, implored the Jesuit missionaries to secure the tapestries from the Governor-General in order to present them to the Emperor—not in the name of the King and his ministers, since that would appear to be an offer of tribute from an inferior—but in the name of the French missionaries.41 In the meantime, Bertin, in a letter to Ko and Yang dated 31 December 1766, had presented similar statements, noting that it was the intention of the King of France that the tapestries should be presented to the Emperor not as a gift from the King but as part of an attempt to learn what would be the taste of the Emperor for such productions of France’s arts and manufactures.42

  • 43 Benoist uses the word placet, a term for an official letter or legal document and the term used to (...)
  • 44 Cordier 1917: 308-312, 316-318.

14Benoist, in his letter to Bertin of 12 October 1766, notes that he had prepared a formal request, a memorial,43 on the resolution of all these issues, including the tapestries, which was presented to the official he described as the Prime Minister, a favourite of the Emperor, who received it on 21 May 1766. The Minister summoned Benoist, accompanied by the Jesuit Brother Jean-Denis Attiret (1702-1768), himself a painter in the service of the Emperor, to meet the next day. No resolution of the question, however, came until several months later, when the Emperor, who had communicated in the interim with the Governor-General of Canton, ordered that all the missionaries’ requests should be honoured, including the delivery of the tapestries to Beijing. Given the date late in the year 1766, Benoist doubted that he would be able to send additional news to Bertin before the following year.44

  • 45 Cordier 1917: 318-331; the porcelains are briefly noted on 325.
  • 46 Cordier 1917: 321-323.
  • 47 For one concise summary of the European Palaces, see Rinaldi 2016: chap. 13, “Michel Benoist (1715 (...)
  • 48 The set of engravings, the “20 Views European Palaces,” is referred to by various titles (one comm (...)
  • 49 Cordier 1917: 322.

15Benoist continued the story of the tapestries and other gifts, including the Sèvres porcelains, almost exactly one year later in a letter to Bertin dated 10 November 1767.45 The tapestries had arrived in Beijing at the end of the previous year, on 8 December 1766, and the next day they were closely examined by the Emperor, who was truly pleased with them.46 Benoist’s letter referred to a Mandarin, an official of the court with whom he had direct relations, who informed him that the Qianlong Emperor first thought he would put the tapestries in temples in the Forbidden City, but apparently the Emperor was aware that the Jesuits would be offended by their use in temples dedicated to gods the missionaries did not recognize—or so Benoist wrote. In the end, the Emperor ordered that they be used to decorate the European Palaces of the Yuanmingyuan. Beginning in 1747, the Qianlong Emperor had commissioned the construction of a group of buildings, gardens and fountains in a hybrid Sino-European style, the so-called “European palaces” (Xiyanglou).47 Given that none of the extant buildings was large enough to display the tapestries, however, the Emperor ordered the construction of a new building. Plans for the structure called the Yuanyingguan (the Observatory of Distant Seas) were completed in 1767, seen here in a copperplate engraving commissioned by the Qianlong Emperor (fig. E2).48 Construction would begin in the spring of the next year, with Benoist taking charge of the hydraulic works and fountains as he had in the earlier constructions on the site.49

Fig. E2. Yilantai (伊蘭泰, act. ca. 1749-1793) and others, “Yuanyingguan zhengmian” (遠瀛觀正面), Main façade of the Observatory of Distant Seas), no. 14 of the “Twenty Views of the European Palaces of the Yuanmingyuan”

Fig. E2. Yilantai (伊蘭泰, act. ca. 1749-1793) and others, “Yuanyingguan zhengmian” (遠瀛觀正面), Main façade of the Observatory of Distant Seas), no. 14 of the “Twenty Views of the European Palaces of the Yuanmingyuan”

Copperplate engraving (50 x 87.5 cm), ca. 1783-1786. © The Getty Research Institute, 86-B26695, Digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program.

  • 50 For the details of the Qianlong Emperor’s reception of the missionaries’ gifts, see Cordier 1917: (...)
  • 51 Benoist refers to the church as the “Église du Dieu du Ciel,” no doubt a reference to the Beitang, (...)
  • 52 Cordier 1917: 325, “De tous les Tartares et les Chinois qui ont vu ces tapisseries et porcelaines, (...)

16In his letter, Benoist provided a clear distinction between gifts—présents—offered to the Emperor by the missionaries, which were accepted as a sign of special favour for the respect and devotion accorded him by those in his service, and the gifts offered by foreign states as tribute.50 The Emperor would accept the missionaries’ gifts directly in a more personal relationship, while those that were seen as foreign tribute would pass through a complex process of review by numerous government offices, which, despite the Emperor’s recognition of the independence of the sovereigns of European nations, would continue to treat such gifts as tribute. Benoist recounted to Bertin how questions raised by the Qianlong Emperor about the tapestries were relayed to him, surely by officials of the court, although he did not specifically name who these might be, and he related how he replied. Benoist explained that although the tapestries were from the royal manufactory, they were not a gift from the King of France but a special presentation from the six French missionaries who live in the Christian church within the imperial city.51 Benoist further explained that the reason the tapestries did not conform to the size of tapestries first ordered by the Qianlong Emperor some 15 years earlier is that they were not those previously ordered, and Benoist did not know how or to whom the original order was sent. The Emperor then asked why were these tapestries sent. In his reply, Benoist replied with a statement that Europeans knew of the goodwill the Emperor felt for the missionaries who served him and how they would like to present a sign of their gratitude. He then recounted his negotiations in order to secure their delivery to Beijing. As a reward for the tapestries, the Qianlong Emperor ordered that each of the six French missionaries resident in Beijing be presented with four bolts of silk, for which they expressed their customary gratitude. Benoist then noted that among the “magnificent” pieces of porcelain brought to China by Ko and Yang, some had been broken, no doubt as a result of the seizure of the gifts by the customs officials, but that those presented to the Qianlong Emperor had been received with the same satisfaction as the tapestries, and even the Chinese and the Tartars—i.e., the Manchus—who had seen the tapestries and the porcelains admitted that they were incomparable to what was known in China.52

Conclusion. Gifts and History

  • 53 The best summary of the various tapestries ostensibly looted from the Yuanmingyuan appears in Rado (...)
  • 54 L’Art pour tous 1861: no. 16, 63. On the “Foire chinoise” and it’s publication in L’Art pour tous, (...)

17The later history of the second Tenture Chinoise in China is complex but incomplete. In October of 1860, British and French troops looted the Yuanmingyuan in the course of the Second Opium War (1856-60), and a large number of Qing imperial objects were brought back to Europe.53 Among them was the tapestry depicting the “Foire chinoise,” which was auctioned in Paris in 1861 but unfortunately destroyed in a fire in 1871. In 1861, the journal L’Art pour tous published an illustration and a very brief account of the “Foire chinoise” (fig. E3).54 The captions in French, German, and English provide brief, though somewhat inaccurate information on the tapestry, but they do include perceptive comments. The editors appeared to know that the tapestry was part of an effort by Louis XV to forge diplomatic relations with the goal of promoting commercial exchanges between France and China. The subject of the tapestry is thus described as a vast market attended by merchants from distant lands, an image that reflects the goals “half-concealed in the royal gift.”

Fig. E3. L’Art pour tous, vol. 1 (1861), no. 16, p. 63, xviiie siècle

Fig. E3. L’Art pour tous, vol. 1 (1861), no. 16, p. 63, xviiie siècle

Fabrique de Beauvais, Tapisseries de haute lice, “La Foire chinoise.” Source: Heidelberg University Library (CC-BY-SA 3.0).

  • 55 The discussion of Chinese tapestries in European style is indebted to Rado 2017. For comprehensive (...)
  • 56 Rado 2017; see esp. the section entitled “The Whereabouts of the Tenture Chinoise and some other E (...)
  • 57 These issues and related questions are discussed in detail in Smentek 2017.
  • 58 A final volume based on Bertin’s collection was published in 1814; two additional volumes are desc (...)

18The Qing imperial court workshops had started producing imitations of European tapestries in the years before the arrival of the second Tenture Chinoise, and the reception of these six tapestries inspired an increased production of tapestries in China imitating European styles and replicating European weaving techniques.55 The second Tenture Chinoise—and surely the other gifts sent to China by Louis XV—were well-received in the Qing imperial court, but they did not have the results the King and Bertin had first hoped for. Contrary to what Bertin had anticipated, the gift of the second Tenture Chinoise did not establish a market for French tapestries in China, although a certain number of other examples were sent later in the eighteenth century.56 Effectively, Chinese imperial production in European styles took the place of the market for European luxury goods that the French had sought to develop.57 For Bertin, however, the arrival of Ko and Yang in Beijing and the establishment of direct contact with the Jesuit missionaries began what he first called the “Correspondance littéraire de la Mission française de Pékin.” This led to an exchange of letters, articles, translations, paintings, prints, and objects that provided a vast body of knowledge about ancient and contemporary China. Bertin had much of this material published in the fifteen volumes entitled Mémoires concernant l’histoire, les sciences, les arts… des Chinois between 1776 and 1791.58

  • 59 A number of the references here are cited in conjunction with the detailed list of the gifts above (...)
  • 60 See Bertin’s assertion of these goals in the text and his handwritten additions to Bib. Inst. MS 1 (...)

19Among the gifts from France to the Emperor of China, Ko and Yang took with them a selection of books and articles, a number of maps and plans, and twenty-three short volumes on the arts and sciences that were published by members of the Royal Academy of Sciences or supervised by the Academy.59 All of these reflect what was sometimes explicitly stated as the comparability between France and China—China being the only nation outside Europe considered to be at an equivalent level of civilization to be seen on an equal footing with Europe. If the gifts from Louis XV were intended to stimulate commerce and international exchanges, the books and maps would demonstrate the commensurability of the two great nations. Maps would show the distance between France and China; plans of the Louvre, Versailles, and other royal residences would demonstrate the magnificence of the French kings; and learned publications would give an idea of the importance the King places on the arts and sciences—as does the Emperor of China.60 Through the presentation of sumptuous gifts, visual images, and written texts, Louis XV and Henri Bertin took part in a traditional approach to what might be characterized as tentative diplomatic relations with the Qing empire—relations that turned out to be far more complex than any of the actors in this encounter first imagined.

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Bibliographie

L’Art pour tous (1861). No. 16, 31 August 1861.

Badin Jules (1909). La Manufacture de tapisseries de Beauvais depuis ses origines jusqu’à nos jours. Paris, Société de propagation des livres d’art.

Bailey Gauvin Alexander (1999). Art on the Jesuit Missions in Asia and Latin America, 1542-1773. Toronto, University of Toronto Press.

Bernard Auguste (1867). Histoire de l’imprimerie royale du Louvre. Paris, Imprimerie impériale.

Bernard-Maître Henri, S.J. (1949). “Deux Chinois du xviiie siècle à l’école des Physiocrates Français.” Bulletin de l’Université l’Aurore: 151-197.

Bernard-Maître Henri, S.J. (1950). Les Tapisseries chinoises de Boucher au Palais Yuen-Min-Yuen de Pékin. Paris and Lille, Éditions Cathasia.

Bion Nicolas (1709). Traité de la construction et des principaux usages des instruments de mathématique… Paris, La Veuve de J. Boudot et al.

Breton de La Martinière Jean Baptiste Joseph (1811-1812). La Chine en miniature, ou Choix de costumes, arts et métiers de cet Empire. 6 vols. Paris, Nepveu.

Cordier Henri (1917). “Les Correspondants de Bertin.” T’oung Pao 18(4/5): part vii, Michel Benoist.

Dehergne Joseph, S. J. (1964). “Voyageurs chinois venus à Paris au temps de la marine à voiles et l’influence de la Chine sur la littérature française du xviiie siècle.” Monumenta Serica, 23: 372-397.

Dehergne Joseph (1965). “Les deux Chinois et Bertin: l’enquête industrielle de 1764 et les débuts de la collaboration technique franco-chinoise.” PhD diss., History, Paris, EPHE, VI sec.

Dehergne Joseph, S. J. (1973). Répertoire des Jésuites de Chine de 1552 à 1800. Rome/Paris, Institutum Historicum/Letouzey & Ané.

Explication des peintures, sculptures, et autres ouvrages de Messieurs de l’Académie Royale (1742). Paris, Jacques Colombat.

Félicité Indravati (2019). “Les présents diplomatiques entre Asie et Europe à l’époque moderne”. In the present volume, Des arts diplomatiques. Échanges de présents entre la Chine et l’Europe, xviie-xviiie siècles.

Hevia James L. (2003). English Lessons: The Pedagogy of Imperialism in Nineteenth-Century China. Durham/London, Hong Kong, Duke University Press/Hong Kong University Press.

Hucker Charles O. (1985). A Dictionary of Official Titles in Imperial China. Stanford, Calif., Stanford University Press.

Kleutghen Kristina (2015). Imperial Illusions: Crossing Pictorial Boundaries in the Qing Palaces. Seattle/London, University of Washington Press.

Mémoires concernant l’histoire, les sciences, les arts, les mœurs, les usages, &c. des Chinois: Par les missionnaires de Pekin (1776-1791). 15 vols. Paris, Nyon.

Monnet Nathalie (ed.) (2004). Chine. L’empire du trait. Calligraphies et dessins du ve au xixe siècle. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France.

Rado Mei Mei (2017). “Qing Imperial Encounters with European Tapestries: The Tenture Chinoise and Beyond.” In Pascal-François Bertrand and Audrey N. Maupas (ed.), Arachné: un regard critique sur l’histoire de la tapisserie. Rennes, Presses universitaires de Rennes.

Rado Mei Mei (2018). “The Empire’s New Cloth: Western Textiles and Imperial Identity at the Eighteenth-Century Qing Court.” PhD diss., New York, Bard Graduate Center.

Reed Marcia, and Paola Demattè (ed.) (2007). China on Paper: European and Chinese Works from the Late Sixteenth to the Early Nineteenth Century. Los Angeles, Getty Research Institute.

Rinaldi Bianca Maria (2016). Ideas of Chinese Gardens: Western Accounts, 1300-1860. Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press.

Rochebrune Marie-Laure (de) (2019). “Les porcelaines de Sèvres envoyées en guise de cadeaux diplomatiques à l’empereur de Chine par les souverains français dans la seconde moitié du xviiie siècle.” In the present volume, Des arts diplomatiques. Échanges de présents entre la Chine et l’Europe, xviie-xviiie siècles.

Roi Jacques, R.P. (1964) “Visite en 1764 de deux Chinois à la Manufacture royale de Sèvres.” Cahiers de la céramique, du verre et des arts du feu, 33: 29-42.

Silvestre de Sacy Jacques (1970). Henri Bertin dans le sillage de la Chine: 1720-1792. Paris, Éditions Cathasia/Les Belles Lettres.

Smentek Kristel (2016). “Chinoiseries for the Qing: A French Gift of Tapestries to the Qianlong Emperor.” Journal of Early Modern History, 20: 87-109.

Smentek Kristel (2017). “Tapestries for the Emperor: Taking the Tenture Chinoise to Beijing.” In Imagining Qianlong: Louis XV’s Chinese Emperor Tapestries and Battle Scene Prints at the Imperial Court in Beijing. Hong Kong, University Museum and Art Gallery of the University of Hong Kong: 27-39.

Thomas Greg M. (2008). “The Looting of Yuanming and the Translation of Chinese Art in Europe.” Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide, 7(2) (Autumn). On line [http://www.19thc-artworldwide.org/index.php/autumn08/93-the-looting-of-yuanming-and-the-translation-of-chinese-art-in-europe], accessed on 23 February 2018.

Tythacott Louise (ed.) (2018). Collecting and Displaying China’s “Summer Palace” in the West: The Yuanmingyuan in Britain and France. Abingdon/Oxford, Routledge.

Voyage et Séjour en France par Ordre du Roi de Deux Particuliers Chinois, les Sieurs Kô & Yang (1765). Bibliothèque de l’Institut de France, MS 1520: fols. 50-55.

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Annexe

Glossary

Beitang 北堂

Gao Leisi 高類思

Gao Ren 高仁

Guangzhou 廣州

pailou 牌樓

tsung-tu (zongdu) 總督

Xi’anmen 西安門

Xiyang lou 西洋樓

Xiyang lou shuifatu 西洋樓水法圖

Yang Dewang 楊德望

Yang Zhide 楊執德

Yilantai 伊蘭泰

Yuanmingyuan 圓明園

Yuanyingguan 遠瀛觀

Yuzhi gengzhi tu 御製耕織圖

Zhongnan hai 中南海

Annex. The Présents from France for the Emperor of China

Une tenture des six Tapisseries des Chinois (A set of six tapestries of the Chinese).

Deux portraits par Vigée, avec glaces et bordures (Two portraits by Vigée, with glass and frames).

Une caisse de douze glaces de 30 sur 24 pouces (A case of twelve panes of glass, 30 by 24 pouces).

Un ensemble de porcelaine de Sèvres (A selection of Sèvres porcelain).

Une imprimerie portative, garnie de tous ses utensiles et de quatre caisses de caractères français (A portable printing press with all of its equipment and four cases of French type).

La machine d’électricité de Brisson (Brisson’s electrical apparatus: i.e., a Leyden Jar).

Une collection de lunettes d’approche (A collection of spyglasses).

Un télescope (A telescope).

Une chambre noire (A camera obscura).

Un microscope solaire (A solar microscope).

Un microscope à liqueur (A hand-held microscope).

Deux montres d’or (Two gold watches).

23 Cahiers des arts du Libraire Saillant (A selection of twenty-three booklets on the arts from the bookseller Saillant).

Livres du Libraire S. Vallat (Books from the bookseller Vallat).

Cartes géographiques…, plans de Paris, du Louvre, de Versailles et des autres maisons royales (Geographical maps…, plans of Paris, the Louvre, Versailles and other royal residences).

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Notes

1 Silvestre de Sacy 1970: 164-165.

2 There are a number of variants of the names Ko and Yang, and birthdates cited for the two men are also inconsistent. Ko is the equivalent of the pinyin Gao, and his Chinese name is given as Gao Ren (b. 1732) or Gao Leisi [Louis Gao]. Yang’s Chinese name is Yang Zhide (1733-98?) or Yang Dewang [Étienne Yang]. Dehergne 1973: nos. 425, 911.

3 The Compagnie des Indes was only briefly attached to Bertin’s ministry from 1763 to 1764, as cited by the Bibliothèque nationale de France (hereafter BnF) [http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb124915923.public], accessed 28 October 2016. See Silvestre de Sacy 1970: 48-49; the author states that Bertin’s jurisdiction dated only to 1764. Ko and Yang had left Beijing in July 1751 but did not arrive in France until a year later, in July 1752, when they were taken by the Jesuits to the Collège Henri IV in La Flèche. See Silvestre de Sacy 1970: 159-160; the author based his research on Bernard-Maître 1949 as well as Dehergne 1965.

4 For the date of Ko and Yang’s request, see also Silvestre de Sacy 1970: 160. The incomplete, 12-page printer’s proof of the Voyage et Séjour is contained in a volume in the Bibliothèque de l’Institut de France (hereafter Bib. Inst.), MS 1520: f. 50-55; see p. 10 of the proof: “Au commencement de l’an passé 1764…” It also includes a hand-written note asking if the proof is acceptable, in which case the printer will produce 20 copies. La Chine en miniature, Breton de La Martinière 1811-1812: vol. I, Préface, xx-xxi and n. 1, notes that the French Revolution had cut off contact with the French Jesuit missionaries in Beijing and asserted that any broader circulation of the Voyage et Séjour than the 20 copies actually printed might have compromised Ko and Yang if the booklet had reached China. La Chine en miniature is based on previously unpublished papers from Bertin’s collections.

5 Transcriptions of French texts follow the spelling and punctuation of the original; all translations are my own. Voyage et Séjour en France, 10: “M[onseigneu]r Bertin, Minister and Secretary of State, disposed in our favour, wanted to make us useful to France and, at the same time, to China: consequently, we were committed to delaying our voyage by one year.” “Monseigneur” in this context is equivalent to the English honorific title “My Lord.”

6 This phase of Ko and Yang’s instruction is described in Bernard-Maître 1949: 151-197.

7 Mémoires 1776: vol. I, Préface, iii; much of the Preface is taken up with the story of Ko and Yang. See the discussion of the Mémoires concernant les Chinois below.

8 Mémoires 1776: vol. I, Préface, iii: “[…] the drawing of a machine, of a loom, of an instrument, or a plant would supplement what was missing in the most detailed descriptions, and indeed infinitely surpass them.”

9 The prints and drawings are bound into the beginning of Bib. Inst. MS 1520: f. 8-13.

10 The source for the Gengzhi tu images would be a late seventeenth–century edition of the album. See Monnet 2004: cat. 115, Yuzhi gengzhitu: 181-184. Bertin himself possessed two versions of the album, and both are inscribed with the same title: Culture et Récolte du Riz and Éducation des Vers à Soie; BnF, Département des Estampes et photographie Oe-89-4 and Rés Oe-90-Pet. fol. The first is a colored edition; the other black-and-white.

11 The text is found in Bib. Inst. MS 1520: f. 23-33; it is transcribed in Bernard-Maître 1949: 167-174. On many of the issues considered here, see also Smentek 2017. I would like to thank the author for generously sharing a draft of this essay.

12 Bernard-Maître 1949: 160. For the Imprimerie royale, which functioned from 1640 to 1797, see Bernard (1867).

13 The “Remarks on different manufactures” are found in Bib. Inst. MS 1520: f. 40-47; see Bernard-Maître 1949: 161-65, for a complete transcription of the manuscript. The descriptions of each of the manufactories is followed by comments entitled “Réflections.”

14 “Two or three tapestries from this country in the palace of the Emperor would perhaps give him more pleasure than all the magnificent thrones with which he decorates his court. He would be surprised by the brightness of the colors and the beauty of the design. Figures and flowers are preferable to all other subjects, but the figures must be decent, because the Chinese are very delicate on that subject.” Bernard-Maître 1949: 161; the author dates the document to 1764; the source is Bib. Inst. MS 1520: f. 40-47, as in the preceding note.

15 For Bertin’s complete “Instruction,” see Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 60-71; for the list, see f. 62, which notes the panes of glass, the tapestries, the porcelains, and the portable printing press. These and the additional items are cited in the Voyage et Séjour 1765: 11-12. Bernard-Maître 1949: 183-185, includes a list of most of the gifts, citing in n. 101 that it appears in the Department of Manuscripts of the BnF in the documents contained in the Fonds Bréquigny: vol. 1, f. 6-7. However, only a brief mention of the “présens [sic] précieux dont le Roi les avoit gratifiés”—not a complete list—is found on these pages. A document in Bib. Inst. MS 1526: f. 118-119, contains a table in six columns entitled “Compte général des dépenses faites pour Mrs. Ko et Yang Chinois” (General accounting of the expenses for Messrs. Ko and Yang, the Chinese), giving the dates for various expenses incurred by Ko and Yang in 1764 and early 1765, including the gifts ordered by Bertin. Silvestre de Sacy 1970: 164, also provides the list of gifts, apparently citing Bernard-Maître 1949: 184. Other sources essentially confirm the list Bernard-Maître published. See additional notes below on sources for individual gifts.

16 Bernard-Maître 1949: 184, n. 103, cites Bib. Inst. MS 1526: f. 118 verso, for the payment of 262 livres to the painter, who was surely Louis Vigée (1715-1767), the father of Élisabeth Louise Vigée-Lebrun (1755-1842).

17 The traditional French pouce measured approxi­mately 2.7 cm; thus these large panes would have measured 81 x 64,8 cm or 31⅞ x 25½ in.

18 Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 11 verso-12 verso; see also the notes added in the margins of this document.

19 The list of Sèvres porcelains appears in Roi 1964: 29-43; see esp. 33 and n. 4, which cites the Archives de Sèvres, registre de livraison, Vy 4: f. 32v. My thanks to Kee Il Choi for bringing this article to my attention. See also Smentek 2017: 34-35.

20 On the Sèvres porcelains, see Rochebrune 2019.

21 Dehergne 1964: 372-397; see esp. 384, n. 46. Dehergne describes it as garnie de ses ustensiles et de 4 casiers de caractères françois, citing Bertin’s “Instruction” of 16 January 1765 for Ko and Yang, Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 60-71.

22 Bernard-Maître 1949: 184, n. 107, refers to the previous citation in his own article on 166, n. 52, in reference to Brisson’s letter to Bertin dated 7 September 1764, Bib. Inst. MS 1520: f. 17-18.

23 This type of microscope consisted of parts attached together by a screw mechanism, one of which held a lens. For an early eighteenth-century description, see Bion 1709: book III, chap. II, 111-114, and pl. 10, facing 114.

24 Bernard-Maître 1949: 183 and n. 100: “deux montres en or de chez Balthazar [à Paris] valant chacune 300 livres”; Bernard-Maître cites Bib. Inst. MS 1526: f. 118. In the abbreviated list of the presents in Bib. Inst. MS 1521, Bertin’s “Instruction” of January 1765, f. 62rv, a note is added in the left margin: “à chacun une montre d’or de Balthazar horloger de Paris.”

25 Bib. Inst. MS 1526: f. 118, notes a payment “à Saillant Libraire pour 23 Cahiers des arts.” For Saillant, see [http://data.bnf.fr/12335507/charles_saillant/], accessed 28 April 2017. These “Cahiers” are surely selections from the Descriptions des arts et métiers, faites ou approuvées par MM. de l’Académie royale des sciences, published by Saillant and, later, his nephew Jean-Luc III Nyon, between 1761 and 1789; see [http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb392175038], accessed 29 April 2017, and follow the link to “notices bibliographiques liées” for some 156 titles.

26 Bib. Inst. MS 1526: f. 118; there is only a simple statement: “au S. Vallat libraire pour fourniture de livres.” See the basic information on Vallat on the BnF website [http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb123804194], accessed 29 April 2017.

27 Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 71 verso.

28 “The gifts that were made in France to Mr. Ko and to Mr. Yang are of a kind from which they would derive no personal use, as we had only intended that these gifts, appropriately and properly distributed with a particular knowledge of those persons, mandarins or nobles, to whom they would be given could secure for them esteem, support, and great advantages in their research…”

[Bertin’s note between the lines and in the margin:] “And as much as they can on those occasions and to those persons from whom we could hope that by doing this it would inspire a taste for the arts of France in China.” Bib. Inst. MS 1521: entry no. X, f. 69 verso-70 verso.

29 Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 62 verso.

30 Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 70 verso.

31 Ko and Yang expressed their gratitude to Bertin and the King of France in the Voyage et Séjour, but the text ends here in mid-sentence on 12: “[N]ous nous conformerons, pour ces présens [sic], aux Instructions que le Roi nous a données par son Ministre…”

32 For a detailed discussion of the second Tenture Chinoise along with Ko and Yang’s role in taking the tapestries to China, see Rado 2017: 119-135; see esp. 120-124. I am grateful to the author for providing me a draft of the essay. Boucher’s ten relevant paintings for the set are in the Musée des Beaux-arts et d’Archaéologie de Besançon. For their first exhibition, see Explication…, 1742: 8-9, no. 21. See also the catalogue information for Boucher’s ten designs in Besançon [http://www.culture.gouv.fr/documentation/joconde/fr/pres.htm], accessed 18 April 2017, search term: “tenture chinoise.” (The two additional paintings appear to be incidental vertical compositions to fill spaces between larger designs.) There is an extensive literature on the tapestries, which were first produced under the supervision of Jean-Baptiste Oudry (1686-1755).

33 Bernard-Maître 1950: 5, “6 pièces des Chinois, livrées à M. Bertin pour envoyer en Chine”; see n. 17, citing Badin 1909: 84.

34 Badin 1909: 36; Badin refers to a “scholar” who has traced the history of Bertin’s set and their return to France—without citing any source.

35 For a recent discussion of the tapestries, which places them in international, inter-cultural, and diplomatic contexts, see Smentek 2016. See also Bernard-Maître 1950.

36 Rado 2017: 122; and see the listing with images for the designs on the website of the Musée des Beaux-Arts et d’Archéologie, Besançon.

37 The tapestry of “La Foire chinoise” is discussed again below.

38 A significant part of Bertin’s correspondence with the Jesuit missionaries is reprinted in eight selections published by Henri Cordier between 1913 and 1922, beginning with “Les Correspondants de Bertin, Secrétaire d’État au xviiie siècle,” in the journal T’oung Pao, Second Series, 14(2) (1913). Cordier identifies his source as the 12 volumes in the Bibliothèque de l’Institut de France, cited in the present paper as Bib. Inst. MSS 1515-1526.

39 Cordier 1917: 295-299. The tapestries are first discussed in this letter; the discussion continues in Benoist’s letter of 10 November 1767, Cordier 1917: 318-31; and ends with a brief reference in the letter of 25 November 1770, Cordier 1917: 332-340.

40 Cordier 1917: 303-304. For Zongdu, the Governor-General’s title, see Hucker 1985: no. 7158, tsung-tu.

41 Cordier 1917: 307. Such actions would also help preserve Ko and Yang’s anonymity and safety.

42 Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 10rv.

43 Benoist uses the word placet, a term for an official letter or legal document and the term used to refer to a Qing court memorial; Cordier 1917: 308-310.

44 Cordier 1917: 308-312, 316-318.

45 Cordier 1917: 318-331; the porcelains are briefly noted on 325.

46 Cordier 1917: 321-323.

47 For one concise summary of the European Palaces, see Rinaldi 2016: chap. 13, “Michel Benoist (1715-74)”; see esp. 135-136, n. 1, which includes a good list of sources.

48 The set of engravings, the “20 Views European Palaces,” is referred to by various titles (one common name is “Xiyanglou shuifatu”) and was completed in February 1787 under the supervision of the Manchu court official and artist Yilantai (act. ca. 1749-93). See Reed and Demattè 2007: Cat. 30. For a concise discussion of the 20 engravings and Yilantai’s role in their production, see Kleutghen 2015: chap. 5, “Staging Europe.”

49 Cordier 1917: 322.

50 For the details of the Qianlong Emperor’s reception of the missionaries’ gifts, see Cordier 1917: 323-325. On the question of diplomatic gifts as tribute, see Félicité 2019.

51 Benoist refers to the church as the “Église du Dieu du Ciel,” no doubt a reference to the Beitang, the French Jesuit Mission’s North Church, originally built in 1703 just to the west of the Zhongnan hai, inside the Xi’anmen gate of the Imperial City. For a brief summary of the Christian Churches in Beijing in the eighteenth century, see Bailey 1999: 109-111.

52 Cordier 1917: 325, “De tous les Tartares et les Chinois qui ont vu ces tapisseries et porcelaines, il n’en est aucun qui n’avoue que ces ouvrages sont inimitables en Chine.”

53 The best summary of the various tapestries ostensibly looted from the Yuanmingyuan appears in Rado 2017. For an introduction to the extensive research on the looting of the Yuanmingyuan, see Hevia 2003. See also Tythacott 2018, esp. the three essays in part I, “Overviews.” For an important article accessible online, see Thomas 2008.

54 L’Art pour tous 1861: no. 16, 63. On the “Foire chinoise” and it’s publication in L’Art pour tous, see Rado 2017: 10, nn. 50, 51. The reproduction in L’Art pour tous is also discussed in Smentek 2016: 88 and fig. E1.

55 The discussion of Chinese tapestries in European style is indebted to Rado 2017. For comprehensive research and analysis of the reception of European textiles in Qing China, see Rado 2018.

56 Rado 2017; see esp. the section entitled “The Whereabouts of the Tenture Chinoise and some other European tapestries in the Qing palaces”: 124-128.

57 These issues and related questions are discussed in detail in Smentek 2017.

58 A final volume based on Bertin’s collection was published in 1814; two additional volumes are described as “suppléments” to the Mémoires (1776-1791).

59 A number of the references here are cited in conjunction with the detailed list of the gifts above. For the books, see Bernard-Maître 1949: 183 and n. 98; for the publications from the Royal Academy of Sciences, see Bernard-Maître 1949: n. 99, citing Bib. Inst. MS 1526: f. 118, dated 14 January [1765?]; for the maps, plans, and articles, see Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 71 verso; and note that this document contains the only reference to maps, plans, etc. For the articles, see Bib. Inst. MS 1526: f. 118, entry no. 22, “à Saillant Libraire pour 23 Cahiers des arts.”

60 See Bertin’s assertion of these goals in the text and his handwritten additions to Bib. Inst. MS 1521: f. 71 verso.

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Table des illustrations

Titre Fig. E1. François Boucher (1703–1770), sketch for “La Foire chinoise”
Légende Oil on canvas, 1742 (41 x 65 cm). © Musée des beaux-arts et d’archéologie de Besançon (D.843.1.9)/Photo P. Guenat.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/extremeorient/docannexe/image/2447/img-1.jpg
Fichier image/jpeg, 2,8M
Titre Fig. E2. Yilantai (伊蘭泰, act. ca. 1749-1793) and others, “Yuanyingguan zhengmian” (遠瀛觀正面), Main façade of the Observatory of Distant Seas), no. 14 of the “Twenty Views of the European Palaces of the Yuanmingyuan”
Crédits Copperplate engraving (50 x 87.5 cm), ca. 1783-1786. © The Getty Research Institute, 86-B26695, Digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program.
URL http://journals.openedition.org/extremeorient/docannexe/image/2447/img-2.jpg
Fichier image/jpeg, 1,9M
Titre Fig. E3. L’Art pour tous, vol. 1 (1861), no. 16, p. 63, xviiie siècle
Crédits Fabrique de Beauvais, Tapisseries de haute lice, “La Foire chinoise.” Source: Heidelberg University Library (CC-BY-SA 3.0).
URL http://journals.openedition.org/extremeorient/docannexe/image/2447/img-3.jpg
Fichier image/jpeg, 6,4M
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John Finlay, « Henri Bertin and Louis XV’s Gifts to the Qianlong Emperor »Extrême-Orient Extrême-Occident, 43 | 2019, 93-112.

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John Finlay, « Henri Bertin and Louis XV’s Gifts to the Qianlong Emperor »Extrême-Orient Extrême-Occident [En ligne], 43 | 2019, mis en ligne le 01 janvier 2024, consulté le 15 mai 2025. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/extremeorient/2447 ; DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/extremeorient.2447

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Auteur

John Finlay

Actuellement chercheur associé au Centre d’études sur la Chine moderne et contemporaine (CECMC), ses recherches en cours portent sur les échanges entre France et Chine au xviiie siècle. Parmi ses publications récentes : « Henri Bertin (1720-1792) and Images of the Yuanmingyuan in Eighteenth-century France », dans Louise Tythacott (dir.), Collecting and Displaying China’s “Summer Palace” in the West : The Yuanmingyuan in Britain and France (Abingdon, UK/New York, Routledge, 2018, p. 123-137).
Finlay’s research now focuses on encounters between France and China in the eighteenth century. One of his latest publications is “Henri Bertin (1720–1792) and Images of the Yuanmingyuan in Eighteenth-Century France,” in Louise Tythacott (ed.), Collecting and Displaying China’s “Summer Palace” in the West: The Yuanmingyuan in Britain and France(Abingdon, UK/New York: Routledge, 2018, p. 123–137).

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