Jumeau Doll

Emile-Louis Jumeau, a French doll maker used the term "bebe" (which really translates better to infant, not baby) doll to represent a child aged two to eight years. Historians Francois and Danielle Theimer have found that the first Jumeau bebe doll head mold was inspired by "Henry of Navarre at the age of 4." (He became Henry IV of France in the 16th century.) The idea of a doll representing a child came from child-like dolls made in Japan and exhibited at the 1855 Exposition Universelle in Paris. Until the second half of the 19th century, doll makers made dolls that looked like adults. The bebes, on the other hand, had round faces, chubby cheeks, large eyes, and stocky, childish bodies.