Art Institute of Chicago
Hudibras and the Lawyer, plate twelve from Hudibras
William HogarthLinkedCulture matchlcp-4bc0237dded5
- Date
- February 1725/26
- Medium
- Etching and engraving in black on cream paper edge, mounted on cream wove paper
- Culture
- England
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Institution
- Art Institute of Chicago
- Object ID
- 184617
William Hogarth here depicted Hudibras’s visit to a lawyer who encourages the knight to write a letter to the woman he is courting. Just as Hudibras is a play on the popular figure of the “heroic knight,” Samuel Butler used his past experience in law to satirize the lawyer. Hogarth translated Butler’s humorous critique into the engraving by showing a robed and wigged lawyer sitting in his office like a king on his throne. Hogarth’s engravings of Butler’s satirical epic summarize the social and political environment in England with the same cleverness and wit seen in his later works, including the Marriage à la Mode and A Harlot’s Progress .
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Provenance & credit
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- Credit line
- Sara R. Shorey Endowment; purchased with funds provided by Phyllis Neiman and the Woman's Board in honor of Phyllis Neiman
Linked open data
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- Object type
- AAT300041273
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