The first serio-comic map of Europe

A hugely influencial caricature map, the prototype of the anthropomorphic 'Serio-Comic' maps of Europe made famous by F.W. Rose. Within months the design was being reproduced throughout Europe. Issued in the first year of the Crimean War, it shows the major players as animals: Britain as a lion, shouldering a gun; France as the imperial eagle with Napoleon III under its wing; Russia as a bear with a cat-o-nine-tails, with 'regions' including 'Slavery', 'Cruelty', 'Oppression' and 'Tyranny'; and Turkey is inevitably a turkey, but no longer the sick bird of old. Other features include Prussia (not yet part of Germany) as a weather-cock, blowing in the wind; the British and French fleets clipping the Russian bears claws in the Crimea; and the 'Cork as Us Mountains' (Caucasus) as a barrier to the Russian push south. According to the original covers (not present here) the map was 'Designed & Etched by T.O.', identified in a contemporary review as Thomas Onwhyn (1814-86). He is best known for his pirate 'Illustrations to the Pickwick Papers' and 'Nicholas Nickleby' (under the pseudonym Samuel Weller); Dickens himself commented on 'the singular vileness of the illustrations' (Letters of Charles Dickens).