Voltaire Medallion In Calcification, Late 18th Century.

Rare portrait of Voltaire with laureate head in calcification, perhaps from Saint-Nectaire.
Unsigned, titled on the border "AROUET DE VOLTAIRE".
Diam. : 15.2 cm
Restoration at the border in the lower left quarter. Some slight lack of calcification, at the letters VOL and the pearl border on the right side.
The Carnavalet museum has a very close bronze medallion, bearing the full name of the writer, and a slightly different design but it seems from the same hand, dated from the end of the 18th century.
The typology of the laureate Voltaire corresponds to the last decades of the 18th century, as well as the use of the name Arouet de Voltaire referring rather to the Old Regime.
The first attempts at calcification took place at the end of the 18th century before becoming fashionable at the beginning of the 19th century, for example in Saint-Nectaire.