Antique French portrait paintings?

I assume these to be painted as the no lines appear smooth and the broaches r greatly enhanced.. being the fleur de lis I assume French, could possibly be charcoal of some sort? They appear to be of some important stature

 

A bourgeois couple. They look like enhanced photographs. Would/could you post photographs of the backs?

Debora

 

Looks like some kind of prints with some hand painted jewellery embellishments.

 

The images appear to be a type of photograph known as a solar enlargement. The process was most popular from the 1880s to about the 1930s, after the introduction of more sensitive gelatin-bromide photographic papers. It was common to "work-up", or touch up, the images with graphite and/or colored paints or crayons.

Here is an article explaining the history and process -

http://resources.culturalheritage.org/pmgtopics/2005-volume-eleven/11_14_Whitman.pdf

 

This is great information, thank you

 

Interesting. Thanks