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Home arrow The Pioneers

The Pioneers
Page 3 of 35

Execution broadsheet
'Execution broadsheet' depicting the beheading of Lord William Russell for high treason in London in 1683.
Indeed, because so few early woodcuts have survived, there is controversy among historians about when the conventions we associate with modern comics originated. Certainly, these sheets show evidence of word-balloons and speed-lines, as well as a certain level of dexterity in juxtaposing words and images. Also, panelled borders were not uncommon (the first religious sheets were sometimes subdivided like altarpieces). Thus the idea that the 'language of comics' was solely the invention of the modern era is manifestly mistaken.
Londoners fleeing to the country because of the plague
Broadsheet showing Londoners fleeing to the country because of the plague, 1630. Anonymous woodcuts such as these were the earliest form of illustrated mass communication, and flourished in the seventeenth century.
Arguably the next key step in the development of mass-circulation broadsheets was the industry that grew up around public executions, where artists' impressions of the grisly events were sold as souvenirs. The main centre for executions in Britain was Tyburn, in London (near what is now Marble Arch) where between 1300 and 1783 roughly 10,000 people were put to death by various means (hanging and burning being the most common). The gibbet was surrounded by open galleries for the public - crowds of 100,000 were not unusual - where the sheet-sellers would ply their trade.
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