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Gin lane
Title
Gin lane [graphic] / design'd by W. Hogarth.
Edition
[State 3].
Publication
[London] : [Wm. Hogarth], publish'd according to act of Parliamt., Feb. 1, 1751.
Physical Description
1 print : etching and engraving ; plate mark 38.9 x 33 cm, on sheet 61.1 x 48 cm
Medium
laid paper.
Notes
Title engraved above image.
State and publisher from Paulson.
Verse below image: Gin cursed fiend with fury fraught, makes human race a prey; it enters by a deadly draught, and steals our life away ...
Companion print: Beer Street.
Provenance
Formerly owned by Frederick Edward Sotheby of Ecton, Northants, 1837-1909.
Formerly owned by Charles Kinnaird, 8th Lord Kinnaird of Inchture (1780-1826).
Formerly owned by Queen Charlotte, the album bound according to Her Majesty's direction.
George Steevens bequeathed this collection to William Windham (1750-1810). At Windham's death, the collection was put up for sale on 20 July 1810 and was bought in by Mrs. Windham at 292 guineas; by descent through the Windham family; Sotheby's, 17 February 1919 to Dyson Perrins for £400; Sotheby's sale including Property of the Late C.W. Dyson Perrins, Esq., 11 June 1959, lot 100 purchased by Maggs Bros. for W.S. Lewis for £1300.
Summary
In the streets of the slum Ruins of St. Giles, Westminster, the only business are S. Gripe pawnbroker (left), Kilman Distiller (right) and the undertaker (background right). It is a scene of urban desolation with gin-crazed Londoners -- charity children, mothers and babies, trades people, cripples, etc. -- shown dead or dying, fighting, or stupefied with drink. Notably in the foreground a syphilitic mother sitting on the steps lets her child fall to its death over the railing, towards a flagon labeled "Gin Royal", as she takes a pinch of snuff; below her in the steps, an emaciated, bare-chested ballad-seller sleeps with a glass in one hand and a basket and a jug in the other; the ballad hanging from the basket is entitled 'The downfall of Mdm Gin". His dog looks down at the empty glass. On the right in a crumbling building a barber is shown hanging by his neck; below a crowd is being pushed back towards Kilman Distiller. Mid-ground a woman is being placed in a coffin, her child weeping on the ground beside the coffin. Another child is impaled on a spit and carried along by a cook with a bellows on his head. In the background is the tower of St George's Bloomsbury; in this state, the child's face has been changed so that the face is wizened and the eyes sunken.
Format
Images
Language
English
Added to Catalog
August 04, 2011
References
Catalogue of prints and drawings in the British Museum, v. 3, no. 3136
Paulson, R. Hogarth's graphic works (3rd rev. ed.), no. 186
Subjects
Subjects (Local Yale)
Genre/Form
Satires (Visual works) - England - 1751.
Engravings - England - London - 1751.
Etchings - England - London - 1751.
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