John Law on the Donkey of Sancho Panza

This Dutch engraving ridicules the Scottish financier John Law and his Mississippi Company scheme, which collapsed in 1720, ruining thousands of investors across Europe. Law rides a collapsing donkey while demons and fantastical creatures cavort around him; a flag promises wealth, and ships appear in the background as crowds gesture in despair. The print exemplifies the Northern European satirical tradition—rooted in Bruegel and developed through Hogarth and Gillray—of using allegorical chaos, grotesque figures, and slapstick disorder to expose financial fraud and human folly. The dense composition and fine engraving lines show how printmakers deployed visual complexity to moralize about greed and deception. Such prints circulated widely, reaching ordinary people with political and economic commentary, establishing techniques later adopted by comic strips and editorial cartoons.