
The cheval glass (also cheval mirror, psyche mirror, horse dressing glass, swing glass) is a free-standing large mirror, usually with a tilt mechanism, that provided a complete reflection from head to foot (thus also the full-length mirror name). This furniture piece was created in the late 18th century for a
dressing room
A changing-room, locker-room, (usually in a sports, theater, or staff context) or changeroom (regional use) is a room or area designated for changing one's clothes. Changing-rooms are provided in a semi-public situation to enable people to ch ...
and went out of fashion after being replaced by the mirrored doors of
wardrobe
A wardrobe or armoire or almirah is a standing closet used for storing clothes. The earliest wardrobe was a chest, and it was not until some degree of luxury was attained in regal palaces and the castles of powerful nobles that separate acco ...
s
in the first half of the 20th century.
Construction
The mirror hangs between two vertical columns frequently connected by two horizontal
planks in a frame-like arrangement. Each column rests on two splayed feet. The mirror features a tilt mechanism so that it can be used at different angles, and sometimes also has a height adjustment pulley with lead counterweights.
[
In 1803, ]Thomas Sheraton
Thomas Sheraton (1751 – 22 October 1806) was a furniture designer, one of the "big three" English furniture makers of the 18th century, along with Thomas Chippendale and George Hepplewhite. Sheraton gave his name to a style of furniture charac ...
produced a design combined with a desk that included drawers on one side and writing surface on another.[
]
Etymology
The ''cheval'' comes from the , "horse". Different explanations are given for the reason of its use:
* "horse" is a name for the adjustment pulley;[
* ''cheval'' in a meaning of support framework (cf. , "]easel
An easel is an upright support used for displaying and/or fixing something resting upon it, at an angle of about 20° to the vertical. In particular, easels are traditionally used by painters to support a painting while they work on it, normally ...
");
* overall bulkiness and heavy weight;
* large mirror size that allowed a horse to be seen in its entirety.
The association between Psyche
Psyche (''Psyché'' in French) is the Greek term for "soul" (ψυχή).
Psyche may also refer to:
Psychology
* Psyche (psychology), the totality of the human mind, conscious and unconscious
* ''Psyche'', an 1846 book about the unconscious by Car ...
, a woman in the Greek mythology who became a goddess, and the mirror dates back to a book by Jean de La Fontaine
Jean de La Fontaine (, , ; 8 July 162113 April 1695) was a French fabulist and one of the most widely read French poets of the 17th century. He is known above all for his ''Fables'', which provided a model for subsequent fabulists across Eur ...
, '' Les amours de Psyché et de Cupidon'' (1669). La Fontaine retells the ancient Cupid and Psyche
Cupid and Psyche is a story originally from ''Metamorphoses'' (also called ''The Golden Ass''), written in the 2nd century AD by Lucius Apuleius Madaurensis (or Platonicus). The tale concerns the overcoming of obstacles to the love between Psyc ...
story using flowery language to describe an extravagant palace of Cupid with plenty of mirrors and fountains. In the book, Psyche takes a bath upon arrival in the palace, looks at herself in the mirror, and is washed yet again before spending a night of love with Cupid. While wandering through the palace afterwards, she stumbles upon a sculpture gallery of famous beauties whose good looks brought demise to their nations, like Helen of Troy
Helen of Troy, Helen, Helena, (Ancient Greek: Ἑλένη ''Helénē'', ) also known as beautiful Helen, Helen of Argos, or Helen of Sparta, was a figure in Greek mythology said to have been the most beautiful woman in the world. She was believe ...
and Armida of Damascus, and suddenly sees herself amidst them. While La Fontaine does not explain how this happened, a contemporary reader was familiar with mirrors on the walls and statues in front of these mirrors. The subsequent verse,
where Psyche watches herself in mirrors with delight, triggered the use of while referring to the full-length mirror once it was invented.
History
Manufacturing of large mirrors was generally beyond the technological abilities of the humanity prior to the 18th century, although there were possibly few very old predecessors of a full-length mirror. Seneca
Seneca may refer to:
People and language
* Seneca (name), a list of people with either the given name or surname
* Seneca people, one of the six Iroquois tribes of North America
** Seneca language, the language of the Seneca people
Places Extrat ...
describes some Hostius Quadra Hostius Quadra was a Roman slave-owner famed for his sexual licentiousness. He was murdered by his own slaves, supposedly on account of his sexual appetites.
Life
Hostius Quadra lived during the reign of the emperor Augustus. ″The profligate nat ...
who enjoyed performing sex acts in front of the mirror, which should have been much larger than the typical handheld mirrors of Antiquity. Story of Medusa
In Greek mythology, Medusa (; Ancient Greek: Μέδουσα "guardian, protectress"), also called Gorgo, was one of the three monstrous Gorgons, generally described as winged human females with living venomous snakes in place of hair. Those ...
and Perseus
In Greek mythology, Perseus (Help:IPA/English, /ˈpɜːrsiəs, -sjuːs/; Greek language, Greek: Περσεύς, Romanization of Greek, translit. Perseús) is the legendary founder of Mycenae and of the Perseid dynasty. He was, alongside Cadmus ...
suggests that it was possible to use a polished shield as a large-size mirror. A bronze mirror found in the grave of Marquis of Haihun
Liu He (; 92–59 BC) was an emperor of the Chinese Han dynasty with the era name Yuanping (). Originally King (or Prince) of Changyi (), he was installed by the powerful minister Huo Guang as emperor in 74 BC, but deposed only 27 days later, and ...
in China (died in 53 BC
__NOTOC__
Year 53 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Messalla and Calvinus (or, less frequently, year 701 '' Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 53 BC for this year has bee ...
) was 47 centimeters
330px, Different lengths as in respect to the Electromagnetic spectrum, measured by the Metre and its deriveds scales. The Microwave are in-between 1 meter to 1 millimeter.
A centimetre (international spelling) or centimeter (American spellin ...
across (at the thickness of 12 millimeters
330px, Different lengths as in respect to the electromagnetic spectrum, measured by the metre and its derived scales. The microwave is between 1 meter to 1 millimeter.
The millimetre (American and British English spelling differences#-re, -er, ...
).
Most researchers assume the cheval mirror to be a European invention (however, Wu Hung
Wu may refer to:
States and regions on modern China's territory
*Wu (state) (; och, *, italic=yes, links=no), a kingdom during the Spring and Autumn Period 771–476 BCE
** Suzhou or Wu (), its eponymous capital
** Wu County (), a former county ...
asserts that the furniture piece was first created in China using European glass pane
Plate glass, flat glass or sheet glass is a type of glass, initially produced in plane form, commonly used for windows, glass doors, transparent walls, and windscreens. For modern architectural and automotive applications, the flat glass is s ...
s). The European glass manufacturing breakthrough started in 1664, when Jean-Baptiste Colbert
Jean-Baptiste Colbert (; 29 August 1619 – 6 September 1683) was a French statesman who served as First Minister of State from 1661 until his death in 1683 under the rule of King Louis XIV. His lasting impact on the organization of the countr ...
stole the secrets of mirror manufacturing from Venice, thus enabling the construction of the Hall of Mirrors
The Hall of Mirrors (french: Grande Galerie, Galerie des Glaces, Galerie de Louis XIV) is a grand Baroque style gallery and one of the most emblematic rooms in the royal Palace of Versailles near Paris, France. The grandiose ensemble of the h ...
in the Palace of Versailles
The Palace of Versailles ( ; french: Château de Versailles ) is a former royal residence built by King Louis XIV located in Versailles, about west of Paris, France. The palace is owned by the French Republic and since 1995 has been managed, u ...
. The size of individual mirrors was still small: the 17 seemingly large window-like panes in the Hall of Mirrors are in fact stitched from 357 small pieces of mirror glass. In 1687, developed a process of glass casting
Glass casting is the process in which glass objects are cast by directing molten glass into a mould where it solidifies. The technique has been used since the 15th century BCE in both Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia. Modern cast glass is formed by ...
that enabled first truly large glass mirrors, impossible to make using the traditional glass blowing
Glassblowing is a glassforming technique that involves inflating molten glass into a bubble (or parison) with the aid of a blowpipe (or blow tube). A person who blows glass is called a ''glassblower'', ''glassmith'', or ''gaffer''. A ''lampworker ...
process. Martin Lister
Martin Lister FRS (12 April 1639 – 2 February 1712) was an English naturalist and physician. His daughters Anne and Susanna were two of his illustrators and engravers.
J. D. Woodley, ‘Lister , Susanna (bap. 1670, d. 1738)’, Oxford Dic ...
reported in 1699 seeing an 88 by 48 inches mirror with thickness of just inch. The cost of mirror production rapidly decreased: in the beginning of the 18th century a 180 by 100 centimeters mirror would fetch a princely sum of 750 British pounds
Sterling (abbreviation: stg; Other spelling styles, such as STG and Stg, are also seen. ISO code: GBP) is the currency of the United Kingdom and nine of its associated territories. The pound ( sign: £) is the main unit of sterling, and th ...
(and the larger 230 x 115 cm one was going for "astronomical" 3,000 pounds), the prices had halved by the 1730s. The mirrors were still predominantly installed on the walls, mostly in order to visually expand the indoor space. In China, the period of Emperor Kangxi
The Kangxi Emperor (4 May 1654– 20 December 1722), also known by his temple name Emperor Shengzu of Qing, born Xuanye, was the third emperor of the Qing dynasty, and the second Qing emperor to rule over China proper, reigning from 1661 to ...
saw the creation of a free-standing ''chaping'' mirror-screen.
In Europe, the cheval glasses of approximately the height of the human (1.5 to 2 meter
The metre ( British spelling) or meter ( American spelling; see spelling differences) (from the French unit , from the Greek noun , "measure"), symbol m, is the primary unit of length in the International System of Units (SI), though its pr ...
s) became popular in the late 18th century, originally referred to as ''glass screens'' (by analogy with decorative screens). In 1787, a visitor to Paris recorded the cheval mirror as a "pleasant invention", but by the 1820s-1830s this furniture item became a staple in every bourgeois
The bourgeoisie ( , ) is a social class, equivalent to the middle or upper middle class. They are distinguished from, and traditionally contrasted with, the proletariat by their affluence, and their great cultural and financial capital. Th ...
' bedroom or dressing room. During the process, the mirror shape turned to oval, original harsh lines of the frame were softened, the angle adjustment mechanism was added, occasionally side mirrors were added to expand the reflected area.
Art
The birth of photography coincided with the popularity of cheval mirrors, with superficial similarity between these devices: both produced images of surrounding life on glass surfaces. It did not take long for photographers to exploit the combination of the two: many pictures of nude females were produced by the commercial studios in the 1850s-1860s. A creative take on the mirror and photography belongs to Lady Clementina Hawarden
Clementina Maude, Viscountess Hawarden (née Elphinstone Fleeming; 1 June 1822 – 19 January 1865), commonly known as Lady Clementina Hawarden, was a British amateur portrait photographer of the Victorian Era. She produced over 800 photographs ...
: the mirror is used to reflect the camera, not the subject.
In the late 19th century, The Bath of Psyche
''The Bath of Psyche'' is an oil painting by Frederic Leighton, first exhibited in 1890. It is in the collection of Tate Britain.
Description
The painting shows Psyche (mythology), Psyche disrobing in order to bathe before the arrival of Cu ...
painting by Frederic Leighton
Frederic Leighton, 1st Baron Leighton, (3 December 1830 – 25 January 1896), known as Sir Frederic Leighton between 1878 and 1896, was a British painter, draughtsman, and sculptor. His works depicted historical, biblical, and classical subjec ...
became an iconic expression of the tripartite unity of feminine beauty, classical art, and large mirror (the painter used the surface of the pool for the reflection effect). The artists pandering to the consumerist society found it easy to please customers through this combination and chose Psyche
Psyche (''Psyché'' in French) is the Greek term for "soul" (ψυχή).
Psyche may also refer to:
Psychology
* Psyche (psychology), the totality of the human mind, conscious and unconscious
* ''Psyche'', an 1846 book about the unconscious by Car ...
, a mortal turned into a goddess, as a representation of a woman, creating a new, commodified
Within a capitalist economic system, commodification is the transformation of things such as goods, services, ideas, nature, personal information, people or animals into objects of trade or commodities.For animals"United Nations Commodity Trade ...
, image of this mythical figure in front of an eponymous
An eponym is a person, a place, or a thing after whom or which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. The adjectives which are derived from the word eponym include ''eponymous'' and ''eponymic''.
Usage of the word
The term ''epon ...
mirror. Félix-Jacques Moulin
Félix-Jacques Antoine Moulin (27 March 1802 – 12 December 1875) was a French photographer.
In 1849, Moulin opened a photographer's studio at 31 bis rue du Faubourg Montmartre and started producing daguerreotypes of young girls aged 14 to 16. I ...
became especially prolific in this field after opening a studio in Paris in 1851. Wu Hung mentions another image of this artist, a synthesis of Psyche and Narcissus
Narcissus may refer to:
Biology
* ''Narcissus'' (plant), a genus containing daffodils and others
People
* Narcissus (mythology), Greek mythological character
* Narcissus (wrestler) (2nd century), assassin of the Roman emperor Commodus
* Tiberius ...
, where a female kisses her reflection in the mirror that obviously represents a pond. The aestheticized images of academic art
Academic art, or academicism or academism, is a style of painting and sculpture produced under the influence of European academies of art. Specifically, academic art is the art and artists influenced by the standards of the French Académie ...
continued to exist in parallel to this exploitation, with a notable example of Berthe Morisot
Berthe Marie Pauline Morisot (; January 14, 1841 – March 2, 1895) was a French painter and a member of the circle of painters in Paris who became known as the Impressionists.
In 1864, Morisot exhibited for the first time in the highly es ...
, who boldly used the "woman in front of a mirror" topic but replaced the voyeuristic aspect with female subjectivity.
File:Félix Jacques Moulin (French, 1802 - after 1869, active Paris, France 1840s - 1850s) - (Female nude standing with back to full-length mirror) - Google Art Project.jpg, A nude by Félix-Jacques Moulin
Félix-Jacques Antoine Moulin (27 March 1802 – 12 December 1875) was a French photographer.
In 1849, Moulin opened a photographer's studio at 31 bis rue du Faubourg Montmartre and started producing daguerreotypes of young girls aged 14 to 16. I ...
(1851)
File:Camera reflection in a cheval mirror.jpg, Camera reflection in a cheval mirror by Clementina Maude, Viscountess Hawarden
Clementina Maude, Viscountess Hawarden (née Elphinstone Fleeming; 1 June 1822 – 19 January 1865), commonly known as Lady Clementina Hawarden, was a British amateur portrait photographer of the Victorian Era. She produced over 800 photographs ...
()
File:Frederic Lord, Leighton - The Bath of Psyche - Google Art Project.jpg, The Bath of Psyche
''The Bath of Psyche'' is an oil painting by Frederic Leighton, first exhibited in 1890. It is in the collection of Tate Britain.
Description
The painting shows Psyche (mythology), Psyche disrobing in order to bathe before the arrival of Cu ...
by Frederic Leighton
Frederic Leighton, 1st Baron Leighton, (3 December 1830 – 25 January 1896), known as Sir Frederic Leighton between 1878 and 1896, was a British painter, draughtsman, and sculptor. His works depicted historical, biblical, and classical subjec ...
(1890)
File:Venus in the Mirror.png, Venus in the Mirror (unknown artist, )
File:A nude kissing her reflection in the mirror.jpg, A nude kissing her reflection in the mirror by Felix Jacques Moulin (1854)
File:Berthe Morisot - Psyché.JPG, The Psyche Mirror by Berthe Morisot
Berthe Marie Pauline Morisot (; January 14, 1841 – March 2, 1895) was a French painter and a member of the circle of painters in Paris who became known as the Impressionists.
In 1864, Morisot exhibited for the first time in the highly es ...
(1876)
See also
* The Psyché (My Studio)
''The Psyché (My Studio)'' is an oil on panel painting by the Belgian artist Alfred Stevens. Painted in circa 1871, the painting once belonged to Robert de Montesquiou, and is currently housed at the Princeton University Art Museum located in ...
, a painting by Alfred Stevens
References
Sources
*
*
*
* {{cite book, last=Mitchell, first=J., title=Significant Etymology: Or, Roots, Stems, and Branches of the English Language, publisher=William Blackwood and sons, year=1908, isbn=978-1-9779-4305-7 , url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0OYOAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA197, access-date=2025-01-09
Mirrors