Steal This: La Cité à travers les âges (Paris)

Last week, I mentioned the art and story of Goblin Market, written by Christina Rossetti and illustrated by Laurence Housman. This week, I'm sharing another book from the British Library collection, La Cité à travers les âges, as far as I can ascertain a book about the history of Paris. I'll be up front, I don't know enough French to read the book, but I thought some of the illustrations from the book were well worth sharing. Just a quick note, I don't know how historically accurate the book is but I also don't think that's as important for our purposes here.

Clothing

One of the things I liked about it were the small sketches about clothing through the centuries. Not only does it look at clothing from the 13th through 18th centuries, but the work provides examples of clothing commonly worn by people of different socio-economic ranks. So we see a paysan (peasant) in the same group as a dame noble (noblewoman).

Understanding the differences in dress can make campaigns richer. How far in detail you go depends on you and your group but even just mentioning that noblewomen seem to have more decoration to their dresses and the material seems more flowing or less bulky can help.

Additionally, the various accoutrements can lead provide inspiration for other NPCs in town, someone is either making them or bringing them to the area. Also, if you tire of yet another side quest that could be summed up as a beer run, a necessary item of clothing that was ruined or is unexpectedly needed can provide a diversion.

Items

In addition to clothing, there are a few illustrations of various items including architectural details and furniture. As with clothes, how various items look often change through time, whether due to fashion or advancements (or declines) in technology. In addition to adding richer details, variance in styles, especially in game art, can help show the story of an area in ways that there might not be space to write.

Maps

Books like this can provide nice illustrations of maps that can be reused in a variety of games.

Buildings and Landmarks

Buildings and other landmarks are a common subject for historical illustrations. This book has some that are rougher and older from earlier in the history and others that are more refined (for instance, a cathedral without little to no Christian iconography could be useful as a temple to a god of civilization or knowledge).

Scenes

This book has a number of scenes illustrated as well. Taking the art out of context can provide inspiration for events and NPCs in your game as well. One of the things I liked about this work is the number of women present as key players in some of the illustrations of historical events.

So if you're looking for inspiration, looking at the pictures of old books, even ones written in a language you don't read, can be fruitful. Happy searching!