Daughter of printer Jacques I Estienne, Marie-Nicole Hérissant née Estienne (171?–1798) became Imprimeur du Roi [Printer to the King] in 1772 following the death of her husband, Parisian printer and type foundryman Jean-Thomas Hérissant I (1704–1772). His name appears in the introduction to volume II of Pierre-Simon Fournier’s Manuel typographique.

Marie-Nicole Hérissant printed and published a major typographic specimen in 1772, Épreuve des caractères de la fonderie de la veuve Hérissant. Long considered the first specimen printed by a woman in Western typographical history, we now know that others preceded it. Nevertheless, the mention of Marie-Nicole Hérissant’s name, instead of her late husband’s, is unprecedented for its time. Before her death, she took personal charge of handing over the foundry to her son Jean-Thomas Hérissant II in 1797, as well as passing on her status as Imprimeur du Roi to Étienne-Alexandre-Jacques Anisson-Dupéron. She is also said to have donated some of her foundry’s typographic cases to the Imprimerie Royale [Royal Printing House], now known as the Imprimerie Nationale [National Printing House]. Nowadays, these typographic cases are part of the Cabinet des poinçons archive collection.

Between plagiarism of Pierre-Simon Fournier’s typefaces, proto-Didonne serifs and formal revivals of the Romain du Roi, this specimen is a piece of messy micro-history, to quote the design historian Martha Scotford, interwoven into the neat history of French typography. The aim of this project is to create a typographic, biographical and historical background to the life of Marie-Nicole Hérissant and her various collaborators, in order to bring to light a Parisian micro-history of the Imprimerie Royale and the status of Imprimeur du Roi. Entering French typographic history through the front door, only to exit through the air ducts, the back door, the den.