French (?) handwriting on back of CdV - translation/help please!

[veeblevort]

Thanks China.

[Whipby]

No, and that's a shame. She's missed.

I've studied the original photo carefully under a magnifying glass, and think it's possible that the photographer has added a pin prick of ink to the gentleman's eyes in order to make them more visible. I don't think they've been poked out. Bear in mind that the scan I've posted is far bigger than the original, and his eyes are actually only tiny little dots. But I agree that they don't look quite right, hence my ink theory!

[chinakay]

Yes, quite common for photographers to "enhance" the eyes if they lacked definition, and with some bizarre results. But usually earlier than this photo seems to be because the gent's clothing, or trousers at least, and the studio props don't look very early to me. The mount is a strange one and I think it has been altered.

The eyes do look odd...rather hébété wouldn't you say

Cheers,
China

[Whipby]

It is a strange one, China. It looks as though the mount has been cut to size, trimmed a little - perhaps this was done when someone was cutting off the notepaper. 

Also, something that I haven't mentioned before, is that the writing is stuck on the back of the photo upside down. I've posted both images the right way up, but in fact that's not how it is in the flesh, so to speak.

The big question, China - would you care to hazard a guess at a date?

[chinakay]

Drat! I knew I shouldn't have barged into this thread

Well, since we can't see the proper corners of the mount, and we can't see the back...I'm guessing maybe late 1870s. Maybe.

There's no really dateable clothing but the trousers don't look really early. I say 1870s because of the fringe on the chair at left, fringes on everything were huge in the 1870s. Sort of like the 1970s And the curtain at the left is a holdover from the 1860s, and hardly ever seen into the 80s. Also I can't see any sign of the posing stand that was used to hold the head still, those had disappeared by about 1875. I think he's standing too close to the backdrop to fit one in behind him.

So, it's just a guess, but a fairly decent one. You may get others.

Cheers,
China

[Whipby]

Nudged, China, nudged, not barged!  And you are very welcome.

If it helps, I was also thinking (in my inexperienced-but-learning way) that this photo was likely to ve the 1870s.  You threw me when you thought not very early, so I thought you might be thinking 1890s.

I think this is a bizarre photo to be honest, with the writing on the notepaper stuck to the back.

I wonder if it maybe got accidentally stuck to the notepaper, and the writing is nothing to do with the image, and so someone just cut around it.  The writing is incomplete, so the notepaper must have been bigger than the photo.

Where is Sherlock Holmes when you need him?  By now I'm sure he'd have worked out the height of the person with the scissors merely by the angle of the cuts.

But I do love a good mystery!

[Eidde]

I've been thinking about the final phrase on the page: 'que l'autre'. I think this has to mean 'than the other'. If so, you would expect a comparative term just before it in the text (e.g. plus grand, meilleur, etc). The closest I can get to that is to transcribe the word after 'parait' as 'moins', which would give us

"This one appears to me less [insert list of owls etc] than the other".

I can see 'moin' reasonably clearly, but the 's' needs a bit of imagination and, annoyingly, we don't have any other samples of an 's' on the page. One problem with this sentence (apart from its not making much sense ) is that it's an unnatural place to insert a list. Also, it's not constructed as a question, but it has a question mark at the end. All in all, I'm not too happy with it.

So perhaps as you say, Whipby, this extract is cut from a larger sheet which is unconnected to the photo. There seems to be a crease running down the right hand side of the page, at least in the bottom half - maybe this represents the middle of the original sheet.

I have to say that, if I was going to annotate a photo, I'd cut out my photo-sized piece of paper first before writing on it.

My conclusion is that the writer was a well-travelled, but superstitious, ornithologist who didn't pay attention in craft lessons at kindergarten (probably about 5ft 8in).

Eddie

[Whipby]

  Eddie, aka Sherlock, that did make me laugh!

[Whipby]

Eddie, vv, China and everyone -

What do you think the very first word is?  Or has that already been mentioned?

Because Eddie's translation does seem to make sense, and there is a colon after he word mouins (if that's what it is, which looks likely to me) indicating the start of a list.

By jove I think we've got it!  Thank you ALL!

Now my next quest ... WHY??