Anthropometric File of Anarchists

The Anthropometric File of Anarchists, or more precisely, the Anthropometric Photographs of Anarchists, is a collection of hundreds of police photographs of anarchists in France. These were taken by Alphonse Bertillon and his department between the late 1880s and the 1890s.

As of 2025, the photographs are divided between the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MET) and the Archives de la préfecture de police de Paris. The entire MET collection is accessible and in the public domain.

These documents are valuable for the history of anarchism, the history of the development of police practices, and are also considered works of art. They figure among the earliest police mugshots in history.

Anthropometric photographs of anarchists

History

In the closing decades of the 19th century, the French police underwent a series of transformations that led to the birth of a specific French forensic police. A significant part of this evolution was the arrival of Alphonse Bertillon at the Paris Police Prefecture in 1879. Bertillon gradually developed a filing system known as Bertillonage, also called judicial anthropometry. This innovative system was based on taking a specific number of measurements and photographs of individuals, which was intended to improve the identification of suspects or those on file.

During this same period, anarchists were developing the strategy of propaganda of the deed, with some engaging in terrorist actions targeting political or financial figures they deemed responsible for the significant repression they faced.

The convergence of these two dynamics, among other factors—especially during the period the press dubbed the Ère des attentats (1892-1894)—gave Bertillon increasing authority and credibility to file anarchists using his new methods. Between 1889 and 1894, hundreds of anarchists in France were documented upon arrest or during police raids, often being released shortly after in the latter case. These images are among the earliest police mugshots in history.

Current status

As of 2025, the photographs are divided between the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MET) in New York City (417) and the Archives de la préfecture de police de Paris (462) in file Yb 28. Since 2017, the MET authorizes the use and dissemination of its works that have fallen into the public domain, which concern the entirety of its anthropometric collection of anarchists.

List

Following is an alphabetical list of anarchists found in these collections who have a Wikipedia page – their photographs, the anarchist tendencies they can be associated with, and other relevant information about them.

The indication "Arch. pol." means that the photograph exists but is part of the Archives de la préfecture de police de Paris collections and requires express authorization for its publication.

Bibliography

• Bouhey, Vivien (2009), Les Anarchistes contre la République [The Anarchists against the Republic] (in French), Rennes: Presses universitaires de Rennes (PUR)
• Frappa, Amos (2023), Par l'encre et le sang : Histoire de la police scientifique française [By Ink and Blood: A History of French Forensic Science], Paris: A.F.I.T.T
• Schwager, Nicole (2009), "Polizeiliche Identifikationstechniken und Anarchismus in der Schweiz (1888-1904)", Traverse, vol. 16, no. 1, pp. 41–55, doi: