File:Rights of man alias French liberty alias entering volunteers for the republic (BM 1868,0808.6046 1).jpg

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Rights of man alias French liberty alias entering volunteers for the republic   (Wikidata search (Cirrus search) Wikidata query (SPARQL)  Create new Wikidata item based on this file)
Artist

Print made by: Isaac Cruikshank

Published by: S W Fores
Title
Rights of man alias French liberty alias entering volunteers for the republic
Description
English: Recruits, bound and humiliated, are led off by two grotesque French officers, a third drives them along with his sword. Five famished-looking men have been thrown across the back of a large, clumsy, and scarred horse, where they lie head downwards, screaming. Into the posteriors of the topmost man is thrust a vertical pole, striped like a barber's, and tricolour, which supports a cap of 'Liberté'; he says, "I wont be a Volunteer foutré". Another man says, "if this is Rights of Man & french Liberty Lord have mercy upon us". On the horse's neck sits one of the officers, pointing to his victim and saying, "Vive la Liberté"; he is grotesquely lean and ragged, but has a large cocked hat with tricolour cockade, long queue and gauntlet gloves, jack-boots and spurs. A similar soldier (right) leads the horse by a halter, a sword in his hand; he looks back fiercely, saying, "Come along my brave Volunteers, one Sous per Day in Assignats & Plenty of Water."


Other men are dragged along by ropes attached to the horse; a woman and two ragged children form a chain to pull back a ragged man who is so dragged; he says, "oh mon Dieu, my Wife & my pauvre Famille". Another ragged man has fallen to the ground. Both, though their rags do not cover their nakedness, have some sign of the foppery which English caricature associated with French poverty: one has a ruffled shirt-sleeve (without a shirt), the other's hair is fashionably arranged. Four other men are being driven along behind the horse by the third soldier who says, "Come along and share in the glory of France!"; a man on the extreme left says, cowering in terror, "O I do not wish to go to Glory so soon". 7 May 1791.


Hand-coloured etching
Depicted people Associated with: Johann Friedrich, Count of Struensee
Date 1793 (see comment for date)
Medium paper
Dimensions
Height: 262 millimetres
Width: 360 millimetres
institution QS:P195,Q6373
Current location
Prints and Drawings
Accession number
1868,0808.6046
Notes

(Description and comment from M.Dorothy George, 'Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires in the British Museum', VI, 1938) The date 1791 is perhaps an engraver's error for 1793: the Republic was not proclaimed till 22 Sept. 1792. The first execution by guillotine took place on 25 April 1792, but for some little time the new instrument was called 'La Louisette'. C. D. Hazen, 'French Revolution', 1932, i. 384. The print may relate to the unpopular recruiting law of 24 Feb. 1793. Ibid., ii. 614.

.....................................................................

The print was published shortly after war between Britain and France began in February 1793. The reference to the guillotine in the note at the top of the print indicates that by this time British audiences were identifying the Revolution with bloodthirsty execution. Mention of a wax model of the head and hand of Johann Friedrich Struensee brought matters closer to the British royal family. Struensee, a reforming politician in Denmark who had been executed in 1772, had been the lover of George III's sister, Caroline Matilda, the Danish queen.
Source/Photographer https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1868-0808-6046
Permission
(Reusing this file)
© The Trustees of the British Museum, released as CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
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Date/TimeThumbnailDimensionsUserComment
current07:05, 14 May 2020Thumbnail for version as of 07:05, 14 May 20202,500 × 1,853 (852 KB)Copyfraud (talk | contribs)British Museum public domain uploads (Copyfraud/BM) Satirical prints in the British Museum 1793 image 2 of 2 #8,007/12,043

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