print;
satirical print;
broadside
- Museum number
- 1868,0808.7903
- Title
- Object: First book of the chronicle of the Isles;
- Description
-
Illustration to a broadside, printed in four columns in the manner of a newspaper, and covering the upper part of the third and fourth columns. A W.L. portrait of Mrs. Clarke (unrecognizable, but alluring), standing with one hand on the head of a sofa. In the background are four oval bust portraits of other women: 'Miss Taylor' [see No. 11229], 'Mrs Carey' [see No. 11050], 'Miss Gifford', and 'Mrs Shaw'. The title continues: 'Containing a Curious Display of Female Ambition, Assurance, Success, and Disappointment. Exhibited before the Grand Council of the Isles of Britain, in the First and Second Month, of the Forty Eighth Year of the King, by Mary Anne Clarke.' The text, in eight chapters, is in the quasi-biblical language not uncommon in satires, e.g., No. 6465, and afterwards exploited by Hone. The text is an account of the relations between the Duke of York and Mrs. Clarke, and the Parliamentary proceedings, highly flattering to Wardle and Burdett. It ends: 'And behold he [the Duke] walketh in a vain shew, which shall fade in the sight of the people, whilst the fame of Wardle, Whitbread, and Burdett shall flourish and endure . . . the tergiversation of the Black Coats may whiten his honour [see No. 11269], but who can believe him innocent of folly, vice, and acknowledged adultery ? . . . Now the rest of the Acts of Mary Ann Clarke, ... are they not written in the Chronicles of Blue Covers which flutter on the Stalls.'
March/April 1809
Hand-coloured etching, partly aquatinted, with letterpress text
- Production date
- 1809
- Dimensions
-
Height: 229 millimetres (Plate)
-
Height: 445 millimetres (Printed surface)
-
Width: 181 millimetres (Plate)
-
Width: 350 millimetres (Printed surface)
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- (Description and comment from M. Dorothy George, 'Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires in the British Museum', VIII, 1947)
See No. 11216, &c. A companion print to No. 11311.
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1868
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1868,0808.7903