De Uitbanning, oer Jesuitten uit Spanje (The Expulsion of the Jesuits from Spain)

This Dutch engraving depicts the expulsion of Jesuits from Spain under King Charles III, a pivotal moment in Enlightenment-era church-state conflict. The composition shows robed clerics confronted by armed authority at a city gate, their forced departure rendered through dramatic contrast. The print exemplifies the Northern European satirical print tradition—inheriting techniques from Hogarth and anticipating Gillray—where political upheaval becomes visual narrative. Engraved with fine crosshatching, the work combines reportage with pointed commentary on clerical power. Such prints circulated widely as cheap, portable instruments of public opinion, establishing the visual vocabulary that would flow directly into 19th-century caricature and eventually comic illustration.