Veritable Portrait du très fameux Seigneur mestre QUINQUEMPOIX

This French engraving satirizes the financial collapse of John Law's Mississippi Company scheme. A chaotic street scene depicts speculators, hucksters, and desperate investors crowding around Rue Quincampoix in Paris, where stock trading occurred. Figures tumble and jostle; signs advertise fraudulent ventures. The engraving belongs to the rich tradition of financial satire inherited from Dutch prints and developed through Hogarth and his successors, channeling popular outrage into visual narrative. The composition and mordant French text mock the greed and gullibility that produced the bubble's catastrophe. This work exemplifies how engraved prints functioned as mass media, communicating political and economic critique before newspapers or comics existed.