Enlightenment: Did you mean...?

Many events can be said to have changed history, and not everyone might agree with all of those chosen for this collection, but – undeniably – these twelve would appear somewhere on...

The frontispiece of the Encyclopedia, a massive multi-volume work first published in 1751 and chiefly edited by Diderot (1713-1784). The figure in the centre is Truth whose light radiates forth and disperses the clouds...

An 1814 oil painting by Anocet Lemonnier showing the Parisian salon of Madame Geoffrin (1699-1777). Original title: Une soirée chez Mme Geoffrin. The sitters include Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Denis Diderot, Montesquieu, and...

An oil-on-canvas portrait of the French philosopher, Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu (1689-1755). It is estimated to have been made around the late-18th century by Jacques-Antoine Dassier...

A portrait by the French painter, Maurice Quentin de La Tour of François-Marie Arouet or Voltaire (1694-1778 CE), the French philosopher and historian. It was finished in 1735. The portrait was done in Rococo style using...

An oil-on-canvas 1768 portrait of Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) by Johann Gottlieb Becker. (Schiller-Nationalmuseum, Marbach am Neckar, Germany)

A 1754 oil on canvas portrait by Allan Ramsay of the Scottish philosopher David Hume (1711-1776). (National Galleries Scotland)

A portrait by the French sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon of Francois-Marie Arouet or Voltaire (1694-1778), a French philosopher and historian. It was finished around the year 1778. White Marble has been used for the sculpture. It...

A 1747 painted portrait by Pierre Allais of Madame Marie Thérèse Rodet Geoffrin (1699-1777), famous as a Parisian salon host. (Private collection)

A c. 1769 oil-on-canvas portrait by the French painter, Jean-Honoré Fragonard of Denis Diderot (1713-1784 CE), a French philosopher.