Two Men Discuss Bismarck's Death in a Tavern

This pen-and-ink sketch by Romanian artist Constantin Jiquidi depicts two men in heated conversation at a tavern, their discussion turning on the recent death of Otto von Bismarck, Prussia's Iron Chancellor. A waiter approaches from the right. The dialogue below, rendered in Romanian, captures popular reaction to the passing of Europe's dominant political figure. Jiquidi's work inherits the tradition of political caricature—from Hogarth through Daumier—in which tavern scenes and physiognomic distortion conveyed class, nationality, and opinion. The sketch's rapid, expressive line work and social focus connect nineteenth-century print satire to the emerging comic strip form that would flourish in the twentieth century.