The dance of death: the undertaker and the physician. Coloured aquatint after T. Rowlandson, 1816.
- Rowlandson, Thomas, 1756-1827.
- Date:
- 1816
- Reference:
- 31924i
- Part of:
- English dance of death, from the designs of Thomas Rowlandson, with metrical illustrations, by the author of "Dr Syntax".
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Description
In the town square of an English town, a physician rides on his horse with Death as a skeleton riding behind him. Left, a man and a woman carrying coffins, the man carrying an adult's coffin and the woman carrying a child's coffin
Publication/Creation
[Place of publication not identified] : [publisher not identified]
Physical description
1 print : aquatint, with watercolour ; image 12.3 x 21.1 cm
Contributors
Lettering
The doctor's sick'ning toil to close, "Recipe coffin," is the dose.
Creator/production credits
In 1814 the humorous artist Thomas Rowlandson started to create a distinctive "English Dance of death": Rowlandson produced watercolours of contemporary scenes showing death, and William Combe (a writer) wrote verses describing the scenes. In addition to Combe's verses, each aquatint is accompanied by a couplet in English verse by an unidentified author, and the aquatints were coloured in watercolour by unkown hands. The combined pictures and texts were published by Rudolph Ackermann from his shop in the Strand, London, at a rate of three prints a month from 1 April 1814 to 1 March 1816
References note
R.R. Wark, Rowlandson's drawings for the English dance of death, San Marino, California 1966, pp. 3-27
J.R. Abbey, Life in England in aquatint and lithography 1770-1860, San Francisco 1991, no. 263.
Reference
Wellcome Collection 31924i
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Location Status Access Closed stores