BM12871-liberty-suspended-1817-0023
identifier:
BM12871-liberty-suspended-1817-0023
title:
Liberty Suspended! with the Bulwark of the Constitution!
date:
March 1817
description:
On a platform made from the base of a dismantled printing-press, Castlereagh, Eldon, and Ellenborough display to armed ranks of Sinecurists below the body of Liberty, gagged and bound, hanging from a gibbet which projects to the right from the press, suggesting a guillotine. She holds the "Magna Charta", "Bill of Rights", and "Habeas Corpus"; her gag is labeled "Gagging Bill". A three-legged stool had been kicked from under her feet. Castlereagh, wearing a court suit and Garter robes, stands at the edge of the platform and in front of his colleagues, holding up Liberty's broken staff. Eldon stands impassively, with the Purse of the Great Seal suspended from his neck, holding the mace with its head resting on the ground. With his left hand he supports a large "Green Bag", grasping its neck; it rests on two cloven hoofs and above the neck are folds representing a grotesque sub-human face. On the left of the platform, separated from the others by the upright printing-press, stands the Archbishop, enclosed by wooden rails, reading from a large open book. He holds a crosier and wears a mitre inscribed "Canterbury"; with a grotesque clerical wig; his mouth is wide open and his eyes turned upwards. Sourronding the platform is the audience - rotound civilians, wearing ribbons, gazing up delightedly, and the center figure has a placcard. They are surrounded by mounted Life Guards with plumed helmets and drawn swords. In the background is a hill beside a road on which a man drives towards the gibbet a plumed hearse . On the hill sits John Bull weeping, four men in mourning cloaks and scarves stand round him: Cochrane on the extreme right, Cobbett, Hunt, and Burdett. Source: George.
description:
British Museum #12871
format:
24.3 cm x 34.5 cm
type:
Paper
type:
Etching, hand-colored
coverage:
London, England
relation:
LUCA2017.47 1817
subject:
British Press
subject:
Robert Stewart, Viscount Caslereagh
subject:
John Scott, 1st Earl of Eldon
subject:
Edward Law, 1st Earl of Ellenborough
subject:
Charles Manners-Sutton, Archbishop of Canterbury
subject:
Spa Fields Riots
subject:
Satire
subject:
Politics
subject:
Great Britain
creator:
Cruikshank, George
relation:
Michalak Collection
source:
Loyola University Chicago Archives and Special Collections