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JOHN NORMAN (attributed) (c. 1748-1817)
after Charles Willson Peale (1741-1827)
Etching, c. 1783
Height 28.6, subheight 23.3, width 18.3

  

Boglewood: 1208
Hart:  45
Wick: 17
 

Source image:
Charles Willson Peale, Type B.
Oil on canvas (1776).

  Text: 
The true Portraiture of his Excellency / George Washington esqr. / In the Roman Dress, as Ordered by Congress for the Monument to be erected / in Philadephia, to perpetuate to Posterity the Man who commanded the / American forces through the late glorious Revolution.
 

Version I:  As shown.  Collection:  Yale University Art Gallery; New York Public Library.

Notes:  The Continental Congress unanimously resolved on 7 August 1783 "That an equestrian statue of General Washington, be erected at the place where the residence of Congress shall be established."  The Congress further resolved that the statue was to be in bronze and depict Washington "in a Roman dress, holding a truncheon in his right hand, and his head encircled with a laurel wreath."  Norman based the ancient dress in his print upon John Guillim's A Display of Heraldry (London: 1611, 6th ed. 1724).  Norman's associate, John Coles, Sr., owned a copy of the Guillim book. (Hart, Wick)

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