After looking at the more than 500 images of French society, we decided we wanted to tell a story about how animals were treated and admired during the time of coverage.

We began by downloading all the images that contained animals and thought about why each animals was featured in the image. We realized that in general, horses and dogs are found in the background of images, while more exotic animals such as elephants and birds tend to be the main focus of the images they are in.

Horses especially appear in many of the images. While they are usually being used for labor and carriage pulling, they sometimes appear prominently because they are being ridden by an army general or being used in a jousting competition. Horses also sometimes appear in statues and scultpures associated with army generals.

We hope that this collection of images come together to tell a story of how the people of France used animals in their daily lives, but also admired them and used them to symbolize their amibitions and dreams.

The collection is found at http://animalsoffrance.omeka.net/