Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon. This engraving, of Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon, by Étienne Ficquet based on a 1746 portrait by Jacques-André Joseph Aved, exemplifies the genre of engraved portraits of playwrights, featuring conventions of an academic portrait, with the author's bust, in profile or quarter turn, in an oval; the base on which the oval rests frequently includes such classical iconic symbols of the theater as masks, a torch, a staff and asps. An identical engraving by Bachelou appeared as the frontispiece in Oeuvres de M. de Crébillon (Paris: Imp. royale, 1750) vol I [BN Yf 424]. Ficquet executed a series of such engravings of notable writers, which are in Portraits engravés par Étienne Ficquet, 1738 à 1794 [Paris: 1738 - 1794; Library of Congress, Department of Special Collections, Rosenwald Collection (#1649), from which this image is reproduced.