Jan en Cornelis de Witt Formeren het Eeuwig Edict

This Dutch engraving depicts the de Witt brothers presenting the Eternal Edict of 1667, a political reform that reduced the stadtholder's power. The print employs the formal group portrait convention of 17th-century political satire, using fine engraving to render each figure with individualized features—a technique preceding caricature proper. The composition stages a moment of civic ceremony, though the engraver's line work subtly indicates character through posture and expression. This work exemplifies how Dutch printmakers used engraving to comment on governance before the exaggerated physiognomy of Hogarth and Gillray emerged a century later. The print tradition it represents—visual argument through narrative scene—directly prefigures the sequential political comics and editorial cartoons of modernity.