The powers of Europe as alchemists who dissolve the alliance of German princes with Napoleon. Coloured etching by T. Rowlandson, 1813.

  • Rowlandson, Thomas, 1756-1827.
Date:
Dec. 12 1813
Reference:
543329i
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Credit

The powers of Europe as alchemists who dissolve the alliance of German princes with Napoleon. Coloured etching by T. Rowlandson, 1813. Wellcome Collection. Public Domain Mark. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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About this work

Description

In the centre, Napoleon is being heated in a glass vessel by numerous chemists representing the different countries allied against him: left to right, Poles and Cossacks (seated around table), the Pope (holding vials containing Fulminating Powder and Wrath), Sweden (Bernadotte pouring Sulphat of Swedish Iron into the receiver), Great Britain (John Bull feeding coals into the German stove), a Dutchman with a clay pipe (using the bellows), a Don Quixote-like figure representing Spain (using a pestle and mortar inscribed Saragossa), and others representing the German states

Publication/Creation

London (N. 101 Strand) : R. Ackermann, Dec. 12 1813.

Physical description

1 print : etching, with watercolour ; platemark 24 x 34.4 cm

Lettering

Political chemist and German retorts or desolving the Rhenish confederacy

References note

British Museum, Catalogue of political and personal satires, vol. 9, London 1949, no. 12122

Reference

Wellcome Collection 543329i

Creator/production credits

The depiction of the Polish chemists on the left and the Spanish pharmacist on the right show an awareness of the paintings of alchemists by and after David Teniers the younger, as do the alchemist's paraphernalia lightly etched in the background

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