From the exhibition
Revolutions in Naples in Favor of Charles III
· 1707

This Dutch engraving documents the political upheaval surrounding Charles III's claim to Naples during the War of Spanish Succession. Three scenes show the populace gathering with banners, constructing a wooden siege tower, and destroying symbols of authority. The print employs sequential narrative—a ancestor of comic-strip panels—to compress complex historical events into readable stages. Hand-colored etching on paper, it belongs to the Northern European tradition of political broadsheets that used visual satire and numbered sequences to circulate news among literate and semi-literate audiences. Such prints, precursors to later caricature and the modern comic strip, mixed reportage with commentary, shaping how ordinary people understood state violence and popular resistance.
Public domain, restored and presented by comicbooks.com http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/