Matchmakers
Taras Shevchenko. Matchmakers. Paper, etching 18 × 25,6; 23,8 × 29,9; (26,8 × 35,2) cm. [St. Petersburg]. [Not later XI] 1844. Taras Shevchenko National Museum, inv. number g-376.
Under the image left – signature and date: Shevchenko 1844. Middle – name: Matchmakers. Below – this same title, repeated in French. To the left of it – description of Shevchenko etching:
Go out for year or two, boy with girl, recognizing and pleased, boy sent to girl's father and mother the matchmakers seniors and talkative people for such a thing witty. And when both parents' blessing, the girl tied the seniors with towels over the shoulders takes his bridegroom on a plate or kerchief.
Right from the name – the same text repeated in French:
Un jeune homme après une cour, faite pendant une annèe ou deux a une demoiselle, autant pour se faire apprécier que pour se persuader des bonnes qualités de la demoiselle; envoye aux parents de celle ci et avec son agrément, la demander en mariage. Les porteurs de la demande, qui prennent le nom de Starostis, sont d’ordinaire des hommes influants et des beaux diseurs. S’ils réussissént à faire agréer la demande, la pretendue leurs passe ă chacun un essuie-main sur l’epaule droite en guise d’un cordon; puis elle fait venir le prètendu et lui offre un mouchoir brodé, le plus souvent, de ses propres mains.
Date of etching refined based on a Shevchenko's letter to J. G. Kukharenko of 26 Nov 1844.
Sketches for composition see in album of 1839 – 1843.
Storage areas of described instance: State Hermitage Museum Gallery of pictures Shevchenko, Kharkiv.
In 1911 exposed in an exhibition of works of art Shevchenko in Kiev (catalog, № 82); in 1929 – the exhibition of works of T. Shevchenko in Chernihiv (Catalogue, p. 17, № 2), 1939 – on the Republican Jubilee Shevchenko's exhibition in Kiev (catalog, № 145).
Etching table stored in the National museum of Taras Shevchenko.
L.I. Vnuchkova
After publication: Taras Shevchenko Complete works in 10 volumes. – Kyiv: ed. Academy of sciences of UkrSSR, 1961, Vol. 7, part 1, № 95 (picture), p. 39 – 40 (note).