Gillray Caricatures: Anthropomorphism

Gillray often used animal images in his satirical prints. Portraying Charles James Fox as a human figure with fox’s head and brush, or as an actual fox, is an obvious wordplay which he used frequently in prints of the early 1780s: as with Changing places; - alias; Fox stinking the badger out of his nest (D12982). Such symbolic images were a little old-fashioned by the late eighteenth century however. In John Bull and his dog Faithful (D12566) Gillray uses animals in a different way, by applying their characteristics to the targets of his satire. In this print John Bull is pestered by dogs representing opposition MPs, while the government dog, William Pitt, leads him dangerously close to an abyss. At the time the print was published the imagery was particularly relevant, as a tax on dogs, an early form of licence, had been proposed.

Gillray Caricatures