Marche du Cortege Funebre de Napoleon from Retour en France by Victor Adam 1840

[BONAPARTE, Napoleon] ADAM, Victor. Marche du Cortege Funebre de Napoleon dans les Champs-Elysees. Paris, Jeannin, [1840].
 
Large folio lithograph, 510 x 355 mm. Blind-stamped. Dessine d'apres nature et lithographie par V. Adam. Printed by Lemercier, Bernard et Cie. Occasional scattered spotting, chiefly to the margins, with a few light surface marks; a very good example overall.
 
One of the more dramatic procession scenes from Victor Adam's Retour en France des Depouilles Mortelles de Napoleon, the celebrated suite documenting the exhumation, return, and state funeral of Napoleon in 1840. The plate depicts the imperial funeral cortege advancing through the Champs-Elysees on 15 December 1840, with the monumental catafalque surrounded by cavalry, military detachments, and dense crowds gathered along the ceremonial route. The caption beneath describes the scene as a "veritable triumphal march" worthy both of the vast crowds attending the funeral rites and of the emperor himself. From the original first edition of the complete series of twenty large-format lithographs issued in Paris in 1840.