File:Print, satirical print (BM 1868,0808.13189 1).jpg

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print, satirical print   (Wikidata search (Cirrus search) Wikidata query (SPARQL)  Create new Wikidata item based on this file)
Title
print, satirical print
Description
English: On the left, a clergyman standing beside a beehive holds a honeycomb to his face while bees fly towards a rose of England and a thistle of Scotland; on the right, a scholar sits writing at a desk with books on a shelf behind him.
Woodcut
Date circa 1692
date QS:P571,+1692-00-00T00:00:00Z/9,P1480,Q5727902
Medium paper
Dimensions

Height: 62 millimetres

Width: 104 millimetres
institution QS:P195,Q6373
Current location
Prints and Drawings
Accession number
1868,0808.13189
Notes

Stephen's suggests a date of 1706 presumably referring to the forthcoming Act of Union between England and Scotland.

However, information supplied by Fabienne Gallaire (by email April 2017), allows for a redating of the print to 1692 and a revised interpretation (see below).

The inscription at lower left, "Sic vos non vobis mellificatis apes" derives from a verse in Tiberius Claudius Donatus in his "Life of Virgil" (17,70): "Hos ergo versiculos feci, tulit alter honores, Sic vos non vobis nidificatis aves ; Sic vos non vobis villera fertis, oves; Sic vos non vobis mellificatis apes ; Sic vos non vobis fertis aratra boves."

Hence the caption of the print speaks Virgil's words from the bees' perspective: "Sic nos non nobis mellificamus apes" (so we the bees make honey, but not for ourselves). The honey is being eaten by the clergyman holding a piece of honeycomb.

This print may be the titlepage vignette printed with each number of the monthly "The Complete Library; or, News for the Ingeniuous" (London, printed for John Dunton, at the Raven in the Poultry, 1692, as a continuation of the "Young Student's Library"). (See "The Quarterly journal of science, literature and art", Vol. 13, 1822, p. 47).

Rather than alluding to the Union of Scotland and England, as Stephens suggested (unlikely for a print of 1629), the rose and thistle around which the bees swarm may refer to the idea of an editor intent on listing all of the literary productions from both kingdoms. (With thanks to Fabienne Gallaire).
Source/Photographer https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1868-0808-13189
Permission
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© The Trustees of the British Museum, released as CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
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current10:36, 8 May 2020Thumbnail for version as of 10:36, 8 May 20201,600 × 1,347 (570 KB)Copyfraud (talk | contribs)British Museum public domain uploads (Copyfraud/BM) Satirical prints in the British Museum 1692 image 2 of 2 #68

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