Catalog Archive
Auction 118, Lot 917

"Sons of Neptune Shaving a Landsman",

Subject: Comic - Ships

Period: 1860 (circa)

Publication:

Color: Printed Color

Size:
9.5 x 7 inches
24.1 x 17.8 cm
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Very funny illustration by George Cruickshank showing a group of hilariously dressed sailors about to 'shave' a newcomer with an outrageously outsized razor. Subtitled 'A humorous ceremony performed by Sailors upon every person when first crossing the Line'. Nice example of early printed color. George Cruikshank was a caricaturist in London who illustrated two of Charles Dickens books, Sketches by Boz and Oliver Twist, and also supplied the drawings for Bentley's Miscellany, a journal edited by Dickens. He also did political sketches for both the Radicals and the Tories, and many powerful attacks on the use of alcohol.

References:

Condition: B

Soft crease just into print at lower right and light stains in blank margins. Brown paper hinge on verso of top margin.

Estimate: $80 - $120

Sold for: $60

Closed on 3/6/2007

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