Topical portrait print advertising in London newspapers and The Term Catalogues, 1660-1714

Abstract

This thesis examines the advertisements for portrait prints that were placed in London newspapers and The Term Catalogues between 1660 and 1714. These notices were instigated by specialist printsellers and a large number of participants in the book trade. The majority of these advertisements were placed when the sitters were topical. In chapters four and five each notice is investigated in the context of the sitter’s reputation at the time of advertising. Portrait prints were advertised in response to some of the most significant political events and concerns of the later seventeenth century. Regular portrait print advertising began with a series of notices that were intimately linked with the Exclusion Crisis and it continued to reflect the changing fortunes of the Stuarts throughout the final period of their rule. The advertisements also testify to newspaper readers' interest in European affairs. Portrait prints were marketed of sitters who fought in the Austro-Turkish war and in Baltic and Northern European conflicts. Chapter six demonstrates that portrait print retailers were not the only advertisers to respond to contemporary events and ideas in this way. Portrait prints were advertised alongside topically motivated notices for maps, playing cards, medals and other goods. The evidence presented here highlights the existence of a visual circulation of news previously unacknowledged by text-based scholars of the Habermasian public sphere.