PARIS, FRANCE.- A print by French inventor Joseph Nicephore Niepce dated from 1825, the earliest recorded image taken by photographic means, was sold for $443,220 at Sotheby's in Paris. The image shows a man leading a horse and was purchased by the Musees de France for France's National Library, according to Sotheby's officials. Some years ago André Jammes had the opportunity to acquire a seemingly unassuming reproduction of a 17th century Dutch print together with an extensive series of autograph manuscript letters by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce and his son Isidore. Niépce is recognised for his discovery of the first viable photographic process. His earliest surviving images date to 1826-27. Jammes had discovered an image that pre-dated these. The Niépce correspondence that accompanied the print gave a full, detailed account, step-by-step, of the processes by which Niépce eventually achieved his momentous discovery. The print, discussed and enclosed in a letter from Isidore to their correspondent, is the only surviving testament to Niépce’s triumph. He had at last, in the summer of 1825, achieved his objective of using the power of light alone to make a plate from which an image could be printed.