Abstract
Between 1615 and 1640, Parisian goldsmiths were known throughout Europe for a decorative motif called the cosse de pois (peapod). This design for ornament was based on the representation of the garden pea (pisum sativum), a common staple of the French diet and one of the oldest cultivated crops on the planet. Trained to carve designs into metal, goldsmiths who were unable to join the Parisian guild turned to printmaking as an alternative theatre for the exercise of their craft. The goldsmiths found in the pea a rich medium for exploring analogies between artistic and organic means of generating bodies. Following the devastation of the French Wars of Religion of the late sixteenth century, the pea as the ornament of gold jewellery offered the image of a fecund, regenerative body, a panacea to infertility and an antidote to the parasitic excesses of the nobility
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