Zara in Congreve's The Mourning Bride, Georgian Stage Costume, Jefferys, 1757

This is an original antique copper engraving from 1757, colored by hand, lettered "Habit of Zara, in the Tragedy of the Mourning Bride." Zara turns her head sharply toward the viewer's right, a dagger with a gold hilt raised in one hand and a handkerchief held in the other. Her hair is dressed with jewels and flowers, and strings of pearls hang at her neck and breast. A pink stomacher is laced into a blue bodice with lace ruffles at the elbows, and the gown spreads over a very wide hoop, patterned all over in blue with a zigzag design and large white flowers and foliage.

The English title is engraved in script below the image: "Habit of Zara, in the Tragedy of the Mourning Bride." Beneath it, in smaller italic letters, is the French caption "Habillement de Zara, dans la Tragédie intituleé the Mourning Bride.", meaning "dress of Zara, in the tragedy entitled the Mourning Bride". The plate number 237 is engraved at lower right. The French caption keeps the engraved spelling "intituleé" and gives the play's title in English. No engraver or artist is named on the plate.

The plate comes from the second volume of Thomas Jefferys' A Collection of the Dresses of Different Nations, Antient and Modern, published in London in 1757 by Jefferys, Geographer to his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, in the Strand. The work has a parallel French title page, Recueil des Habillements de Différentes Nations, which is why each plate is captioned in both languages. The later plates of the volume form a series titled The Habits of the Principal Characters on the English Stage, recording how leading parts were dressed in the London theaters of the period. The Mourning Bride, William Congreve's only tragedy, was first acted in 1697 and remained in the repertory of the Georgian stage; Zara is the captive queen of the play.

The patterned blue gown makes a striking picture on its own.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed.