Snapshots of the Past

Daguerreotype portrait of a clergyman in robes holding a book – Antique Photo Print

Daguerreotype portrait of a clergyman in robes holding a book, 1840 — historic photograph
Daguerreotype portrait of a clergyman in robes holding a book, 1840. Historic photograph from the Daguerreotypes & Early Photography collection.

(Each image is professionally and digitally cleaned of artifacts such as color bars and extra borders prior to printing.)

Description

Daguerreotype portrait of a clergyman in robes holding a book comes to life in this historic photograph, reproduced from the original with every detail intact. It comes from the Snapshots of the Past collection, curated over 25 years for its historical value.

Choose the framed print, ready to hang the day it arrives, or the unframed print for a frame of your own. A conversation-starting piece for home, office, or as a meaningful gift. Free shipping in the lower 48 states. Since 2001, Snapshots of the Past has shipped historic prints to tens of thousands of customers around the world.

Daguerreotype portrait of a clergyman in robes holding a book

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Few surviving portraits from 1840 show a clergyman posed with a book, so this daguerreotype stands out on a board crowded with studio sitters. The image was made on a silvered copper plate, a process introduced in France in 1839 that produced a single, mirror-like positive with no negative to copy from. Exposures then ran for minutes, which is why sitters of the period held still with their heads often braced against stands. The book and robes were common props meant to signal learning and religious office, and they tell us as much about how a man of the cloth wished to be seen as the sitter's own features do.

Created / published1840
Original scan3,287 × 4,096 px · prints to 11 × 14 in at 300 dpi
Reference100_Occupational_portrait_o_1840

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Snapshots of the Past helps heritage brands, museums, historians and storytellers tell stories with history: historic prints, image licensing and historical storytelling drawn from more than 25 years of research and curation.

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