Animal Kingdom
Mar 27th, 2008 by houghtonmodern
Benedict von Wagemann (1763-1837), a physician in Ehingen, Germany, published Die konstitutionelle Monarchie der Thiere in 1823. The work describes, in rhyming verse, a council of animals who meet to discuss their current political situation. The animals rebel against their king, design a constitution, and elect representatives to govern themselves.
The engraved frontispiece depicts this council, with over twenty cloaked and spectacled animals of various species discussing their new government:
It is possible that this work inspired a somewhat more famous 20th-century political allegory featuring animals, however, this seems to be the only known copy outside of Germany and the Netherlands. (Feel free to contradict me if you happen to know more; there is very little bibliographic information on this book that I could find.)
As always, clicking on the images will make them larger.
*GC8.W1227.823k. Purchased with the Harry K. Mansfield Book Fund. Images may not be reproduced without permission.
Part of me is tempted to rant about the irony of defacing out of copyright images with an ownership blurb — at least that practice changes in later entries — while posting a very poor quality low resolution digital file and asserting that people can’t reproduce it without permission! But I won’t.
Instead I’ll note that, despite the Animal Farm trope you mention, had the digital file been of sufficient quality, it would – to me – be more interesting perhaps to make comparisons of the illustration work with the contemporary output of JJ Grandville and also in respect of the visual types in german childrens books of the same era and its relationship to the monde renversé stylistic theme.
Despite my obvious reservations, I am happy to see your blog appear on the radar and wish you well. If it is at all within your powers, I would love for this particular image to be uploaded in higher resolution format for public access. It is indeed a wonderful illustration that ought to be shared.
There is a new biography about Wagemann including a reprint of the “Monarchie der Thiere”, see the review (in German) at http://mannigfaltigkeiten.twoday.net/stories/5489751/
Hi, that was very informative post and thanks for the share