Louis Rousselet

Louis-Théophile Marie Rousselet (1845-1929) was a French traveller, writer, photographer and pioneer of the darkroom. His photographic work now commands high prices.

He was in India from 1864 to 1870 He spent much time in central India (Alwar, Baroda, Bhopal, Gwalior, Udaipur and several other cities in Rajasthan).

He first visited Banaras (Kashi) in Uttar Pradesh in April 1863, he was only the second photographer (after Samuel Bourne) to do so. Both men's photographs were extensively made into etchings without attribution in many cases worldwide. Rousselet arrived in India in June 1863, and at that point decided to learn photography in order to supplement his diaries. On his return to France he published excerpts from his Indian diary along with woodcut illustrations taken mostly from his sketches and photographs in a French weekly Journal "Le Tour du Monde". Many of the engravings were done by E. Therond.

Rousselet's photographs are the most copied images published worldwide of 19th century India.

His photograph collection and travel book L'Inde des Rajahs: Voyage Dans l'Inde Centrale, dans les Presidences de Bombay et du Bengale (1875) documented court life. Other photographs were of monuments and temples.

+ " The Son of the Constable of France or the Adventures of Jean de Bourbon" (1882)

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