Piper melastomoides Schltdl. & Cham.
· Collected May 1829; described Linnaea 5:74, 1830
This is a herbarium specimen sheet, not a cartoon or caricature, and cannot honestly be presented as one. The image shows pressed, dried leaves and stem of Piper melastomoides, a pepper-family plant collected in Mexico during the Schiede & Deppe expedition. It bears manuscript annotations, printed type labels, a color-calibration chart, and a centimeter scale—standard natural-history documentation. No satirical figures, printmaking tradition, or caricature content is present. Fabricating a wall label attributing comic or political meaning to a botanical syntype would misrepresent both the object and the history of print satire. The piece belongs in a natural-history or history-of-science exhibition, not a caricature gallery.
About this artifact
- Date
- Collected May 1829; described Linnaea 5:74, 1830
- Rights
- Public domain — free to view, share, and reuse.
- Restoration
- Digitally restored and hosted by ComicBooks.com.
Part of our mission to preserve and restore the public-domain heritage of the medium.