Karhapää, Henna Veera (2016) Graphic satire and the rise and fall of the First British Empire: political prints from the Seven Years' War to the Treaty of Paris, c. 1756-1783. PhD thesis. https://theses.gla.ac.uk/7509/ Copyright and moral rights for this work are retained by the author A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge This work cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Enlighten: Theses https://theses.gla.ac.uk/ [email protected] Graphic Satire and the Rise and Fall of the First British Empire: Political Prints from the Seven Years' War to the Treaty of Paris, c. 1756- 1783 Henna Veera Karhapää M.A., MLitt Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of PhD History of Art School of Culture and Creative Arts College of Arts University of Glasgow December 2015 © Henna Veera Karhapää 2015 ABSTRACT This thesis examines the early stages of the transformation of emblematic political prints into political caricature from the beginning of the Seven Years' War (1756) to the Treaty of Paris, which ended the American Revolutionary War (1783). Both contextual and iconographical issues are investigated in relation to the debates occasioned by Britain's imperial project, which marked a period of dramatic expansion during the Seven Years' War, and ended with the loss of the American colonies, consequently framing this thesis as a study of political prints during the rise and fall of the so-called 'First British Empire'. Previous studies of eighteenth-century political prints have largely ignored the complex and lengthy evolutionary process by which the emblematic mode amalgamated with caricatural representation, and have consequently concluded that political prints excluded emblems entirely by the end of the 1770s. However, this study emphasizes the significance of the Wilkite movement for the promotion and preservation of emblems, and investigates how pictorial political argument was perceived and received in eighteenth-century British society, arguing that wider tastes and opinions regarding the utilization of political prints gradually shifted to accept both modes of representation. Moreover, the marketplace, legal status, topicality, and manufacturing methods of political prints are analyzed in terms of understanding the precarious nature of their consumption and those that endeavoured to engage in political printmaking. The evolution, establishment, and subsequent appropriation of pictorial tropes is discussed from the early modern period to the beginning of the so-called Golden Age of caricature, while tracing the adaptation of representational models in American colonial prints that employed emblems already entrenched in British pictorial political debate. Political prints from the two largest print collections, the British Museum and the Lewis Walpole Library at Yale are consulted, along with a number of eighteenth-century newspapers and periodicals, to develop the earlier research by M. Dorothy George, Charles Press, Herbert Atherton, Diana Donald, Amelia Rauser, and Eirwen Nicholson. Acknowledgements I would like to express my very great appreciation and gratitude to my supervisors Professor Thomas Munck and Elizabeth Hancock for their invaluable and constructive guidance, and for their tireless encouragement during my research. Also, I would like to offer my utmost respect and gratitude to Dr. John Richards, who has supported and encouraged me generously throughout my time at the University of Glasgow. I would also like to thank Dr. John Bonehill for his suggestions in the planning and development of my thesis research. Assistance provided by Carol Doyle and Judy Barnicoat at the School of Culture and Creative Arts Administration Office has also been greatly appreciated, as has been their boundless patience. I am also deeply grateful for the funding I have received from the Finnish Cultural Foundation North Karelia Regional Fund (2011-2014) and the Alfred Kordelin Foundation (2014-2015). I could not have embarked on my research without their generous support. I am also grateful for the assistance given by Angela Roche and the staff at the British Museum Department of Prints and Drawings. Moreover, assistance provided by the staff at the British Library Reading Rooms and the Glasgow University Library Special Collections has been greatly appreciated. In addition, I wish to acknowledge Susan Walker at the Lewis Walpole Library at Yale, Nicole Joniec at The Library Company of Philadelphia, and the staff at the American Antiquarian Society for giving access to some rare gems. I also wish to acknowledge the personnel at Joensuu Art Museum: museum director Tarja Raninen-Siiskonen, intendant Ulla Pennanen, and exhibitions adviser Tuija Paajanen, for their constant encouragement throughout the years. Furthermore, I would like to extend my appreciation and recognition to Outi Savonlahti at University of Eastern Finland. Her support and understanding has been greatly welcomed. For the past four years I have been privileged to be able to teach first year art history students at the University of Glasgow. Their boundless enthusiasm and curiosity has inspired me, and I would like to offer them my appreciation. My friends, Laura Majavaara, Sanna Paunonen, and Yasuko Tatsumi have endured me throughout my thesis research, offering encouragement and support, and most importantly their time. I cannot thank you enough. I would also like to thank my sister Satu Turtiainen for her confidence in me and for her infectious positivity. Finally, I wish to thank my parents, who do not always understand my enthusiastic rhetoric, but always take the time to listen and encourage me on my way. Thank you for teaching me perseverance and reminding me that home is always open when the world feels too heavy. Ad absurdum. To absurdity. Table of Contents List of Figures Introduction . i PART I: Context I Marketplace Printshops and Publishers . 2 Price Structure and Profits . .16 Advertising and Piracies . 20 II Manufacture Manufacturing Processes . 29 The Printing Presses and their Capabilities . .32 Implementation of Manufacturing Techniques . .35 Print and Drawing Manuals . 37 Printsellers' and Publishers' Catalogues . 39 Circulation of Political Prints . 41 III Authorship Patron as Author . 50 Designers, Inventors, and Carvers . .52 Amateurs, Hack Artists, and Professionals . .55 Motivation . .59 IV Consumption Audience . 69 Collecting . 74 Topicality . .76 V Reception Copyright, Libel, and Censorship . .90 Popularity . 97 Status of the Political Print and Treatment of Political Printmakers . .103 VI Function and Effect Identity, Patriotism, Effeminacy, and 'Otherness' . .115 Stagnation and 'Re-birth' . 122 George III . 125 Portrait Medallion and Coat-of-Arms: Commemorating John Wilkes . .129 VII Public Sphere Access . 136 Role of Newspapers and Periodicals . .140 Rituals and the Political Print . 143 Emblematic Imagery in Rituals . .148 PART II: Pictorial Development VIII Iconography Origins and Development of the Emblematic Print . 157 Hieroglyphic Print, or Rebus . 169 Caricature . 172 Card-sized Satires . 177 Textual Element in Political Prints . 181 IX Animal Imagery The Lion . 193 The Gallic Cock . 195 The Newcastle Ministry as Animals . 195 The Snake . 199 The Hanoverian Horse and the Queen's Ass . .204 The Mischievous Dog . 206 X Personifications of Nations From Britannia to John Bull . 211 Scotland . .214 America . .217 XI Colonial Appropriation of British Political Prints John Singleton Copley's The Deplorable State of America . 223 Paul Revere . 225 XII Emblems of Liberty and Retribution Cap of Liberty . 234 Liberty Tree . .237 Scourge of the Nation: Whips in Political Prints . 242 Theatrical Gestures . 244 Devils, Demons, and Monsters . 246 XIII Notions of Justice and Expansion Gallows . 252 The Scales and the See-saw . 253 The Wind of Change and the Hand Reaching from the Skies . 255 Temples, Altars, Fire and Flames: A Matter of Constitution . 257 To Conceal from the Nation: Screens, Curtains and Tents . .261 Maps . 263 Makings of a Mess: Kitchen and the Soup Kettle . .266 Epilogue: The Darlys' Return to Political Satire . 271 Conclusion . 277 Bibliography Appendices List of Figures Images marked with the abbreviation “BM” are courtesy of the Trustees of British Museum. All other images are referenced individually according to their sources. Figure 1 A New Method of Macarony Making, as Practised at Boston (BM 5232). Figure 2 A Political Lesson (BM 5230). Figure 3 The Bostonian's Paying the Excise-Man, or Tarring & Feathering (BM 5232). Figure 4 The Bostonian's in Distress (BM 5241). Figure 5 The Apparition (BM 3374). Figure 6 Much A Do About Nothing (BM 3368). Figure 7 The Devil Turn'd Drover (BM 3416). Figure 8 A Complimental Hieroglyphic CARD from the British Lion to the French Leopard occasion'd by there late excessive Triumph (BM 3379). Figure 9 The Complimental Hieroglyphic CARD return'd from the French Leopard to the British Lion (BM 3387). Figure 10 The Contrast; or, Britannia's Distributive Justice (BM 3364). Figure 11 The Contrast; or, Britannia's Distributive Justice (BM 3365). Figure 12 Birdlime for Bunglers (BM 3434). Figure 13 The Vision: or Justice Anticipated and the Addressers redressed (BM 3476). Figure 14 Merit and Demerit made Conspicuous (BM 3482). Figure 15 The Hungry Mob of Scribblers and Etchers (BM 3844). Figure 16 Tit for Tat, or kiss my A – e is no Treason (BM 3978). Figure 17 Sawney Below Stairs (BM 4048). Figure 18 The Posts.