Description

The Marquis Gallyot de Tourny commissioned this sculpture to serve as his funeral monument. It depicts a young woman gesturing with one hand toward an urn bearing the inscription Voilà ce coeur qui nous a tant aimé (Here is the heart that loved us so). The marquis specified that the figure should be a rosière, a virtuous woman of humble circumstances, a choice likely informed by the writings of Enlightenment philosophers, especially Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who championed greater social equality and democratic reform.