Camille Roqueplan

At the Paris Salon of 1836, Camille Roqueplan showed a large canvas taken from a fable by Jean de La Fontaine, the 17th-century poet. A lion has fallen for a shepherdess, and to win her he lets her trim his claws, leaving himself defenceless. The Lion in Love was bought by the Duke of Orléans, heir to King Louis-Philippe. In 1853 it passed to the Marquess of Hertford, whose collection became the Wallace Collection in London, where it still hangs.

Roqueplan came from Mallemort in Provence and studied with the history painters Abel de Pujol and Antoine-Jean Gros. Around 1835 he moved from small landscapes to large storytelling scenes like this one. He was among the first French painters to take subjects from the novels of Walter Scott, the Scottish writer, and he also made lithographs. His younger brother Nestor became a well-known journalist and later ran the Paris Opéra. Camille died in Paris in 1855.