Item Summary

Descriptive Information

Title
The hypochondriac.
Call Number
C South 02/Drawer 06/GC112/Half Folio/Prints GA 2014.00796
Identifier
ark:/88435/k3569c44r
Publisher
[London] : [s.n.], 1788/03/01.
Language
No linguistic content
Date Created
1788
Extent
1 item ; sheet 41.2 x 55.1 cm.
Source Acquisition
Gift of Dickson Q. Brown, Princeton University Class of 1895.
References
Grego I, pp. 314, 316 (gives date as 1792/11/05, publisher as Fores)
Rights Statement
No Known Copyright
Notes
Medium: Etchings, Hand coloring
Depiction: The Hypochondriac is seated in his arm-chair, in night-cap and slippers, and wrapped in a flannel dressing-gown, his arms are folded and his head droops, in melancholy meditation, on his chest. The expression of his features is moody in the extreme. By his side is an iron-clamped chest, to hint that the sufferer is somewhat tenacious of his wealth, although his life has otherwise become insupportably burdensome. Phantoms and figurative horrors of various descriptions, are haunting the invalid'd diseased mind.... A table is covered with Doctor's Stuff, and a well-fed and prosperous charlatan in attendance on the distempered patient, is in consultation with a pretty waiting-maid, whose face and person give indications of the most flourishing health - a palpable contrast to the sufferer on whom she is retained to attend.
Inscribed in plate, lower margin: "The mind disemper'd - say, what potent charm, // Can Fancy's spectre-brooding rage disarm? // Physics prescriptive, art assails in vain, // The dreadful phantoms floating cross the brain! - Until with Esculapian skill, the sage M.D. // Finds out at length by self-taught palmistry, // The hopeless case - in the reluctant fee, // Then, not in torture such a wretch to keep // One pitying bolus lays him sound asleep."
Signed in plate, lower left: "Design'd by James Dunthorne".
Signed in plate, lower right: "Etch'd by T. Rowlandson".

Discovery Information

Subject
Caricature
Illness anxiety disorder—Great Britain—History—18th century—Caricatures and cartoons
Mentally ill—Great Britain—18th century—Caricatures and cartoons
Physician and patient—Great Britain—18th century—Caricatures and cartoons
Quacks and quackery—Great Britain—18th century—Caricatures and cartoons
Medicine—Great Britain—History—18th century—Caricatures and cartoons
Death (Personification)—Caricatures and cartoons
Human skeleton—Caricatures and cartoons
Hallucinations and illusions—Great Britain—Caricatures and cartoons
Women household employees—Great Britain—18th century—Caricatures and cartoons
Suffering—Great Britain—Caricatures and cartoons

Physical Characteristics

File Count
1

Institutional Information

Collection
Selections from the Graphic Arts Collection
IIIF Manifest URL

https://figgy.princeton.edu/concern/scanned_resources/a0ec8e1f-a7c2-4691-a0e3-47a284845ec2/manifest